By Ferzad Palia,
EVP-Viacom18 Media Pvt. Ltd. & Head - English Entertainment
Every youngster in India in the last leg of her or his college years begins to daydream of making a cracking debut trip to Goa with friends to seal the bonhomie. I’ve made a zillion trips since my first. Each time has been fun, of course, with the sun, sands, swaying palms, beer and recliners lining the beaches.
And every trip has added a layer of indelible memory, be it the early impression that first generation hippies made, or the rave parties or the flea markets. But my last trip holds a special place in my heart. The standard fixtures remained, but my most precious memory was in the making this time.
In the last week of December, along with a few of my work mates, I headed to Candolim. The location may be largely overrun by tourist shops, restaurants and hotels, but the purpose of our travel to the popular holiday destination was actually work.
However, ‘work’ at work is, more often than not, a lot of play. It could even mean partying four straight days in a row on India’s favourite beach and grooving to some of the world’s most popular dance music artistes.
But I deviate. My last memory of Goa is also closely linked to my first passion – making money. A lot of it.
So I was at one of India’s most anticipated dance music festivals for four straight days. Each night, tens of thousands of young dance music lovers would ask for more, even as the last set of the day came to an end. On the first night, as the 10 o’clock act came to an end in the wee hours, the organizing team of Vh1 Supersonic seemed to breathe its first collective sigh of relief. Without warning, the hefty audience suddenly broke into a celebratory chorus. I’m not the soppy sort, but tears welled up. Several colleagues present around me silently echoed my emotion. This refrain of solidarity from the audience repeated all four nights.
We remembered our humble beginning. On January 1, 2005, at the stroke of midnight, a five-member team including yours truly dispersed across the old Lower Parel office - 40 music videos, a logo (that some people read as VHR, VHI, VH, etc.) and a couple of 21-inch TV sets dedicated to us (well, not quite exclusive) as we set out on an adventurous voyage, riding on faith, focus and inimitable passion. It’s hard to chronicle every step of these 3,650 days, but some milestones can’t be ignored.
From being questioned as a music video channel called Vh something in just three cities (parts of it, really), we are now the super-power home to the world’s biggest awards, artistes & shows for India… From being non-existent beyond Mumbai, Delhi and Bangalore, we’ve been crowned the number one English entertainment channel across India…
From having to beg for a few thousand rupees from advertisers, partners are now more than willing to offer us multi-crore deals (still tough, but a comparative breeze for the past-masters)... From just a TV channel, we now monetize touch-points across Digital as well as on-ground platforms – Vh1 Supersonic is testimony to that…
From having been a drain on the company’s bottomline, we’ve become one of the most profitable channels that offer the most optimum ROI… From starting out with a thousand-people indoor gigs, a hoard of fans on a Goan beach roared ‘Happy Birthday’ a night before New Year’s Eve, 2014…
I am a part of this history in the making. A history that makes me brim with pride.
Feedback: ferzad.palia@viacom18.com
