In the very first session, as we all sat together, Josy Paul, the Chief Creative Officer and Chairperson of BBDO India, played a clip of Javed Akhtar at his vulnerable best, admitting how he still can’t believe his eyes when he sees his breakfast every day. He spoke under his breath, with a massive lump in his throat, and I knew I had to confess to the room, “I don’t want Akhtar to die.” A once-in-a-generation talent, a storyteller with a treasure chest of anecdotes so rich that even one lifetime feels too short.
Paul smiled and, being the sweetheart he is, didn’t roll his eyes at me. Three days later, I would say the same things about him. Word for word. And I don’t say this lightly—I don’t want Josy to die. Not until he has written three 1,000-page books—a crystal-clear word vomit of everything he has ever felt, seen or lived through.
Josy Paul in session
“Come on, Josy, do it for the copywriters,” I told him selfishly after every session. Because the man who built the revolutionary ad agency David with his bare hands, the man who has been the driving force behind BBDO India’s success, the man who calls himself a shuru without the veteran-stamp guru, shouldn’t be allowed to leave this world until he gives us all the answers. Tsunami Costabir, my WhatsApp bestie for the past five days, made a pact with me to trick Paul into writing those books.
Until that happens, what do I tell my non-advertising friends? Who is Josy Paul? Is he the Rajesh Khanna from Anand, with a bandana so black it would make Sanju baba question his swag? Is he a post-KBC Amitabh Bachchan, who has crossed all rekhas of creativity? Or is he just a guy who makes mavericks look like normal men? His hands may shake, but his iradas are so buland that it’s a shame we don’t hear enough about his audacity. He showed us the commode-cum-office chair he used at David. The kind of work they did, I raised another question with creative envy: “Would these ideas see the light of day today?” He wanted to encourage me, but his face had subtitles. Ugh, I am jealous of the ad creatives of his time. They had the guts, the gall, the gumption to not take prior approvals, go against the grain and JUST DO IT.
My belief only grew stronger when I met Dr Sandeep Goyal on the second day of the workshop. The man who changed the fate of advertising agencies Dentsu and Rediffusion. I stopped counting his advertising reminiscences at 10. He showered us with legendary stories—how they chased AR Rahman in London to make the world’s most downloaded caller tune for Airtel, how they got six Aamir Khans at the price of one to launch Toyota Innova, and how they made Nerolac a household name. My millennial heart was in awe of these memorable, now-vintage ads. And if that wasn’t enough, he told us how before emails existed, people would meet at airport lounges to hand over artwork.
The meeting room, dubbed “the womb”
“Client servicing these days give up too easily, yaar,” he said, and I saw all the copywriters nod like tabletop bobbleheads. His wife, Tanya Goyal, was in the room when he fondly spoke of his second life partner, Gullu. He continued in his signature vocab cocktail of Hindi-Punjabi-English: “Aajkal koi relationships nahi banaunda yaar. Humare functions mein 80% of the crowd was our clients. Even after the work was done, the relationship wasn’t.” This is where, I, a modestly immodest highbrow simpleton from Delhi, related to him. This was coming from a place of love. He spoke about the loyalty of old advertising folk and I think that day, he was probably missing him. In the evening, we cut Mrs Goyal’s birthday cake and I remember telling Ankush, the hospitality manager at The Himalayan Writing Retreat (THWR), that this was the ‘most brownie-ish’ a cake could get.
Josy Paul and Rishabh Nagar
Speaking of the retreat, it has taken on a life of its own. Ideas need oxygen too, and what Chetan Mahajan has built here is more than just brick and mortar. It’s a place where authors, readers and filmmakers feel at home. You see, I’m an engineer-turned-adman, clinging to a grudge that my friends don’t get me. For them, movies are an escape—dressing up to go to a mall and watch something… anything, with a bucket of buttered popcorn and a large Pepsi. I’m cut from a different cloth, and it’s too late for me to make new friends. So, I take myself out on solo dates—to films that excite me, to restaurants I fancy, and for the solitude I seek. I know people like me would be attracted to THWR like magnets. Here, I have hope of finding my community.
Our batch wasn’t the dirty dozen—some of us were well-behaved fools. I met Sourav, unofficially “JNAB”—a village stud busy building his life in Rediffusion Mumbai, with words that smell of the mitti of Punjab. Shoumik Rahate, who beautifully made the first beat of a taal the foundation of his autobiography during an assignment. Yogesh Tiwari, a Goosebumps copywriter who seems too bored by the mundaneness of agriculture brands but has too much love for them to quit. Pooja Daga, who introduced herself by saying that after years of mehnat, she has ijjat in her agency—Ogilvy Mumbai. And Aditi Chikhale, from Synapse, a Goa-based agency, probably living my dream life.
Everyone is invited here but everyone should NOT be invited here. For my campaigns, I draw from my personal experiences. On the last day, Paul gave us an assignment—to think of initiatives for the brand, THWR—but told us to treat it like it was nothing—like it was “grass.” In the three days I spent here, I realised that not everyone was there to listen to Paul, some were there to make this workshop about themselves. Listen, it happens when you’re wounded but that doesn’t make it alright. So, my idea became The Pen Down Sessions: before you pen down thoughts—on paper or out loud—you’ve got to put the pen down and listen. Rebranding the book lounge as an inspiration cell for writers to listen.
To filter out the blabbers, I suggested a foolproof screening process: The Patience Test. A Zoom call with 12 participants, the occupancy of the retreat. The moderator plays Mahajan’s favourite, Leonard Cohen’s Tower of Song. And the writers have to listen to it with their cameras and microphones on. At the end, they will be asked to raise a hand if they got the answer to the meaning of life. If they start giving unnecessary gyan, they’re out. If they reply with ‘do dum dum,’ they’re in. You’ve got to see it till the end to get it.
I went to the mountains looking for words and returned with a newfound respect for silence. And with the knowledge that the grass doesn’t have to be greener—it has to be simpler.
(The author is a copywriter. He pens down his experience from the Dr Sandeep Goyal Creative Writing Workshop for Brands presented by the IAA India Chapter and ETBrandEquity.)
