Creative industries need to drive India's growth story: Gaurav Banerjee

India’s creative industries must move from the margins to the mainstream and become a core driver of the nation’s economic and cultural growth, said Gaurav Banerjee, Managing Director and CEO of Sony Pictures Networks India.

Delivering the keynote address at the 25th edition of FICCI Frames 2025, he underscored the sector’s immense potential and stressed the need to build strong institutional frameworks and talent pipelines that can produce globally scaled content rooted in Indian stories.

He stressed that if India has to write the next chapter of global leadership, we must rely on creativity and technology both. 

"We invest in creativity with the same boldness and vision that we are now beginning to invest around new technologies," he said.

He urged policymakers, media leaders, and creators, to think global in ambition and to push boldly for reform, be experimental and open-minded around regulation.

"India's media and entertainment sector today is almost worth $30 billion and is contributing around 0.7% of our GDP. It's projected to grow at 7 to 8% annually. But nearly all of this is just domestic demand. So the question before us today is what is it that it will take to grow this astronomically? Where and how will the next big league come from?" he said.

Banerjee spotlighted the meteoric rise of the Malayalam film industry as a model for India’s creative economy. Referring to the recent blockbuster Lokah Chapter 1, he said no film had captivated him so deeply since Baahubali. With a budget of under Rs 30 crore, the film has already crossed Rs 300 crore at the box office, proving the commercial potential of strong storytelling. 

Banerjee said the evolution of Malayalam cinema offers important lessons for India’s wider creative industries. “Every year, there are at least two to three such films that are building on a strong foundation. Lokah is just the next chapter in this journey,” he noted, urging the industry and policymakers to focus on how many such success stories can be nurtured in the coming years.

Laying out a roadmap for growth, Banerjee called for building world-class creative institutions and centres of excellence that can identify and nurture talent. He stressed the need for deep collaboration between academia and businesses, drawing parallels to the relationship between Stanford University and Silicon Valley. 

“If there is Stanford University, Silicon Valley will follow. In India, we need to build those connections very, very strongly,” he said, adding that government initiatives in this direction were a promising start.