Ashish Chakravarty of Euro RSCG joins Publicis as creative head

Ashish Chakravarty, who had put in his papers at Euro RSCG last month, will be joining Publicis early next week as creative head of the Delhi branch. This will be Chakravarty's second stint at Publicis.

Confirming the development, Param Saikia, Publicis COO, says, "It has always been our endeavour to improve the quality of the creative....Ashish has been a good choice."

Chakravarty would be reporting to Sanjay Sipahimalani, executive creative director of Publicis.

Speaking to agencyfaqs! from Manali, where Chakravarty is vacationing right now, the newly appointed creative says, "One big reason of joining Publicis is Sujit Das. He had been my art partner for seven years, and I had really missed him at Euro RSCG. I had tried to hire him for Euro RSCG but that did not work out. So I have decided to go to Publicis. I am really looking forward to working with him again."

Das, creative director at Publicis India's Gurgaon office, too is eagerly waiting to get back with Chakravarty. "It will be great to be together again. We have really rocked for seven years and we will be doing something like that again," says Das.

Besides Das, an equally important reason for Chakravarty to join Publicis is the pool of young talent at the agency. "Publicis is an agency of young and hungry people. There are very few agencies in the Delhi that can boast of such talent," adds Chakravarty.

Chakravarty describes his stint at Euro as eventful. At the agency, some of his better-known work includes the Voltas Vertis campaign, which is currently on air, and some work on Mortein.

Chakravarty started his advertising career at JWT (then HTA) in 1993. A short while later, he headed for TBWAIndia (then Anthem), where he teamed up with Das to lay the foundations for their enduring partnership.

Within nine months, both Chakravarty and Das left TBWA in favour of McCann, where their partnership - and respective careers - blossomed, working on accounts such as Reckitt Benckiser (the makers of Mortein) and Coke.

"Das and I worked as a great team and won most of the awards… whatever there was to win," he smiles, adding, "I had joined McCann as a copywriter and left the agency as a creative director."

After McCann, the priorities of the duo changed. "We wanted to head a place on our own," says Chakravarty. Euro, Bangalore, gave the duo that opportunity in November, 2000. From Bangalore, it was Euro Delhi, where Das decided to move to Publicis. For a very brief period - November 2002 to March 2003 - Chakravarty joined Das at Publicis, before returning to Euro Delhi once again. © 2004 agencyfaqs!