Ajay Gahlaut to exit Publicis WW; Vikash Chemjong and Basabjit Mazumdar elevated as joint NCDs

Ajay Gahlaut, chief creative officer and managing director, Publicis Worldwide India, has decided to move on from the agency. Gahlaut will be with the agency until mid-August.

 

The agency has also elevated Vikash Chemjong and Basabjit ‘Tito’ Mazumdar to the role of joint national creative directors. The duo will be managing the creative mandate for all brands under Publicis Worldwide including Publicis Capital, Publicis Ambience, Publicis Beehive, Publicis Health, Publicis Emil and Publicis Business. They will report to Srija Chatterjee, MD, Publicis Worldwide, India.

 

Prior to this Chemjong and Mazumdar were national creative directors at Publicis Capital.

 

Anupriya Acharya, CEO, Publicis Groupe, South Asia, said, “Working with Ajay has been a great experience even though our overlap has been only six months! He has built a great team here and we thank him for all his contributions. Am sure he will be successful in whatever he chooses to do next and our best wishes are with him.”

  

Srija Chatterjee, MD, Publicis Worldwide India, said, “Ajay has been a great friend and a fantastic creative leader to have around. Over his 18-month long stint, he has helped build and nurture the creative process and output for a number of brands at the agency. I wish him a great ride in his future endeavours.”

 

She added, “We are fortunate to be running on a Groupe philosophy that thrives on the model of collaboration and ensures that we breed and train talent of great calibre. To that end, both Vikash and Tito come with over 40+ years of combined work experience and have been successfully leading the Publicis Capital business for the last one year, partnering some of our clients in delivering some great work. I look forward to them playing a key role in raising the creative bar.”

 

Gahlaut said, “For me it has been a wonderful year and a half at Publicis. I have made many friends, built a powerhouse creative team and done some nice work. The only reason for moving on is a desire to try new things. This is an extremely exciting time for all kinds of creative content in the country. I have a couple of interesting options I can explore. And while I will never say never to advertising, I thought it was a good time to attempt some things I hadn’t tried before.”

 

He added, “I have always believed in promoting from within and I’m sure that the duo will rise to the occasion. Ranadeep Dasgupta, meanwhile, will look after the New Delhi office and I’m certain that he too will shine in his new role.”

 

Chemjong and Mazumdar added, “It’s a great honour for the both of us. This is a new role but we will deal with it in much the same way as we have dealt with all our briefs. Just roll up our sleeves, order some excellent food and keep at it until we are satisfied. Both with the food and with the ideas! Because we have realised over the years, that if we are happy and convinced about our ideas, more often than not, so are our clients!”