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The Statement of Purpose

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Writing Reality Differently.

Creating Real Advertising.

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If you want to excel in any profession,

you need a sense of purpose. 

The subtitle to this SOP clearly defines

what mine is. If you think it's aligned 

with yours, of if you think you could do

much better in this respect, or if you

think this is plain hogwash, please read on.

 

 

Who Am I...?

A writer who sees the world in images,

and narrates it in edits, first and foremost.

Someone who creates ideas that have 

a different ring and a unique zing.

 

 

Why did I choose advertising?

Because I felt it had a zing... a real one.

I still feel the same way about it.

And I want to create zinging advertising

that cuts through oppositions of thought

by its sheer irrational incision, penetration

and colonisation of the human mind.​

 

 

Why does my work smell different?

That's because I am different.

Psychologically. Mentally. Neurologically.

I have always felt that. Why?

Because I was made aware of it

by the world around me. Not only

do I have dyslexia, but full blown ADHD

and Asperger's too. So yes, in general

I don't look at people when I talk, but

give me a boardroom or a big pitch meeting

with the who and who's of a business empire,

and I lock eyes, talk, enact scripts, and

convince them of the relevance of our idea

unlike anyone you've ever seen.

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Big occasions, big dopamine surges, big rewards

in the offing, big satisfaction after a big and

intense investment of myself, bring out the other me.

The Best of me. Doing what I like best.

Taking it away from everyone else.

That's the part I enjoy the most about advertising.

Cracking an idea, creating a punchy campaign and

snatching the pitch away from someone else.
Everyone else.

 

I love a fight, an argument, a competition during

its making to ensure the perfect film gets made

in the given budget. Whatever seems to not be falling

into the pale of a superb ad film -- voice actors,

music directors, production design, directors'

visions -- I love overturning all such currents.

 

The ocean is too small for me.

I want even the subterranean seas

under the Antarctic ice. And for that, I drill,

not with kerosene powered drilling spouts,

but with steam powered drilling missiles

that break the ice, but only where it's needed. 

 

Sometimes, all of this gives chills to some who

put in that chair. But that's because they

contracted the incurable pneumonia of insecurity,

much before they hired me. I on the other hand,

am immune to it, aware that I'm one of a kind.

 

 

Why do I display this tenacity?

 No, you're wrong, it's not just tenacity.

It's tenacious monstrosity which aims to win

even when everyone's given up. You see,

hope vs uncountable hopelessness, that excites me.

Do I sing songs of optimism every day as

recommended by our times? No. Why? Because

that's not real. It's make believe.

 

The real surge of power, the real fun

is in taking what's real and making it surreal,

taking what's factual and boring and turning it

into laughter for a viewer, a bead of tear for

even an indifferent audience. Converting them

into our audience.

 

That's achievement because that brings about

behaviour change... habit exchange... deletion of

old thinking patterns, and addition of new ones

to one's psychological plane. Or a gorge.

Or a craggy mountain range.

Or whatever the hell the seat of our

feeling-thinking-believing-changing-doing

mechanism looks like. ​

 

 

What are my aims...? Huh!

The real question always is,

"Do you still have the stomach for it...?"

Reading novel after novel, when your

eyes skip words, lines and paragraphs

to start watching a film of your own in your head,

is why I could get only a 51.5% in my grads.

 

They said, Talent hai, academic focus nahin hai.

I said, Aap mein bhi bahut talent hai...

isiliye aapke moonh se bakwaas rukti nahi hai.

 

Barhaal, At Portfolio Night, many years ago,

I received a pat on the back from Piyush Pandey.

 

***(let's not write late before his name, for he opened the door

for writers from every hinterland in India to come and do his

thing in an elitist, permanently upwardly mobile, albeit socially

democratic place like Mumbai, and in that way he lives on as we

walk in his shadow, always trying to leap beyond it... hai na?)   

 

So yeah, pat on the back from the do-it-all,

know-it-all of Indian advertising on my script idea

that Mr. Arun Iyer was judging during Portfolio

Night... it should've translated into a job

at Ogilvy... right? Wrong...! it didn't...

 

Ogilvy didn't know me... neither cared

to know me or the survival needs of me,

a migrant without a silver spoon to this city...

 

I was told by an ACD that I could get

an internship at a 5000 stipend.

 

That's the amount people spend in

a night out in this city.

 

To rent a room, eat 3 meals a day, pay for

my meds, and commute to office... not even

one of those could be done in that amount.

 

I was told it's a rite of passage of 6 months,

but a job isn't guaranteed at the end of it.

 

The thing Ogilvy didn't see was that I was

studying with a scholarship till I was 30.

And that meant, I was different... different enough

to be good enough... even more than good enough...

to not just get a pat on the back from the

Doyen himself, but good enough to be given

the chance to work on key accounts where I

could bring my flavour, my insights, my ideas

of a totally different kind to the service

of Ogilvy & Mather, Mumbai.

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Their Loss.

 

And this loss, turned into a smaller agency's gain.

And then into DDB Mudra's. And Lowe Lintas's.

And Rediff's. And BBH's.

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Why is this prologue necessary?

Because I want to do what even the Doyen couldn't.

I want to democratise advertising further.

I want to create ideas that have the ring of

the real India, with even more depth

and echo than the Doyen could achieve. 

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Tall claim, high hopes, right?

Wrong...!

You know why?

 

A Creative Leader with 34 International awards,

including the Design Gold in Cannes Lion,

had rebuffed me and told me I'm not cut out for ads.

That I wasn't made for it. That I didn't have

an iota of grasp of what it took to be

an ad writer, leave alone, a capable ad film writer. 

 

I said, yeah, maybe you're right.

But what if you're wrong! I need to test it.

 

And then, here I am, 11 years later, still

going strong with a body of exceptional real work

to show. Something on which I plan to excel,

something with which I plan to encourage

every person who's told he's not good enough

because there's something in him that looks 

alien to others.

 

So yeah, I'm here to create the kind of work

that's never been created. But which, everyone

can understand. Work that speaks not in tongues,

but in a language that's uplifting and connected.

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I'm here to leave my mark on any agency that hires me.

I'm here to brand the today and the tomorrow

with work that only I can create.

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Period.​

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