Rohit Gupta, elected the new Chairman of ASCI

At the board meeting, following the 33rd Annual General Meeting of The Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI) held today, Mr. Rohit Gupta, President, Sony Pictures Networks was unanimously elected the Chairman of the Board of Governors of ASCI. Rohit is an accomplished industry veteran having spent over 30 years in holding key leadership positions across consumer, media and entertainment industries.

Subhash Kamath, Managing Partner, BBH Communications India was elected the Vice-Chairman and Shashi Sinha, CEO, Media Brands, was re-appointed the Honorary Treasurer.

Members of the Board of Governors include; Girish Agarwal (Director, Dainik Bhaskar Group), Vikas Agnihotri (Director Sales, Google India Pvt. Ltd.), Mr. Prasun Basu (President – South Asia, Nielsen (India) , Harish Bhat (Director, Tata Global Beverages), Madhusudan Gopalan (CEO, Procter & Gamble Hygiene and Health Care Ltd.), Sandeep Kohli (Executive Director & Vice President, Personal Care Hindustan Unilever), Prof S.K. Palekar (Adjunct Professor & Advisor, Executive Education Institute of Management Technology), N.S. Rajan (Managing Director, Ketchum Sampark), . Abanti Sankaranarayanan (Former Vice Chairperson, CIABC), D Shivakumar (Group Executive President, Aditya Birla Management Corporation), Umesh Shrikhande (CEO, Taproot India Comm), K.V. Sridhar (Founder & Chief Creative Officer (Director), Hyper Collective Creative Technologies ), Sivakumar Sundaram (President Revenue, Bennett Coleman & Co).

Recalling his year at ASCI, the outgoing Chairman D Shivakumar, said “ASCI is a voluntary job and a board led organisation. When I set out last year as the Chairman I had three objectives laid out. The first was to increase our membership base, the second to go digital and third to create awareness among consumers. Now thanks to the MIB directive our awareness has increased immensely, our WhatsApp number has seen a 3X increase in daily messages. We have increased our member base by 10%, our new members representing e-commerce, food & beverage, automotive sectors joining ASCI. ASCI’s digital marketing campaigns would further boost awareness as well as compliance. I wish Rohit and the board the best for the year ahead.”

The incoming Chairman, Rohit Gupta, said, “I am honoured to accept this role and look forward to the year ahead. With the inclusion of the internet into our everyday life and the constant evolution in the digital space, I feel that synchronizing ASCI’s efforts in the Digital space will be our key focus for the year. The Council has covered a lot of ground in addressing the need for self-regulation in the digital medium and work is progressing rapidly to address that need. Additionally, we will continue our efforts to strengthen relationships with stakeholders in the year ahead.”