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Vision Communications Reality Check

A few weeks ago on these E-pages, I wrote about the difference between vision, mission and perspective, and why I increasingly believe perspective is the most honest of the three. After the piece was published, a few readers called. Some agreed with the argument. Some pushed back, especially on vision. They felt vision by definition cannot be too precise. That conversation stayed with me. This piece grows out of that exchange and a longer career spent watching how vision is communicated, sold, defended, and sometimes quietly recycled. In theory, Vision Communications exists to explain where an organisation is headed and why. At its best, it provides direction and reassurance. It helps people make sense of change and reduces uncertainty. Those are legitimate communication goals. Anyone who has worked in PR or corporate communications knows that calm is often as important as clarity. The problem starts when reassurance becomes a substitute for thinking. In many organisations, especially ...
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You Signed Up. Now Turn Up. Or Shut Up!

The closer the T20 Mens World Cup gets, the less patience the system has for posturing. Holding the ICC hostage by running down the clock is not negotiation. It is brinkmanship and brinkmanship works only when the other side is afraid to call your bluff. There comes a point in international sport where adults have to walk into the room and politely ask the drama to step outside. The ICC has reached that point with Pakistan and Bangladesh. Both boards knew exactly what they were signing up for. India and Sri Lanka were confirmed hosts well in advance. This was not slipped into the fine print at 2 am. It was public, debated, contested and finally agreed upon. Participation agreements were signed with full knowledge of the political climate, domestic unrest, diplomatic discomfort and the guaranteed television-panel outrage that would follow. To pretend otherwise now is either intellectual dishonesty or convenient amnesia. Pakistan play all their matches in Sri Lanka. Defending champions I...
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The D’Souzas (and DeSouzas) Are Coming: Hide the Apostrophes!

There are D’Souzas. And then there are DeSouzas. Some come proudly punctuated with an apostrophe: D’Souza, bold and dramatic. Others glide in with an elegant “e,” like a flourish on a wedding invite. DeSouza, if you please. Some wear a capital “S” like a medal of honour. Others settle for a lowercase cousin, quietly efficient. But make no mistake, they're all part of the same sprawling, globe-trotting tribe. A tribe that has left its stamp (and rechado-stained recipe books) across continents, cruise ships, and copydesks. Start with India, of course. Goa and Mangalore were the cradles. Then came the migration to Bombay. Not the city of glass towers and metro lines we know today, but a gritty, bustling Bombay of trams and large waterbodies, hand-written church notices, and one-bedroom chawls filled with six people, a browned flea-flecked clock, and a wall calendar from the local parish. D’Souzas set themselves up in Cavel, Mahim, Orlem, Dadar, Bandra Vasai—anywhere within striking d...
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When the Pie met the Eagle

Every few years, someone tries to decode American Pie and Hotel California. Then someone else declares both songs are about America’s fall from grace, moral decay, the death of innocence, or a particularly bad hangover after the 1960s. If you were a child of that decade, as I was, it wasn’t theory. It was the soundtrack of our growing up. As I lay on our building terrace I didn’t “decode” American Pie; I sang it, trying to remember all eight minutes of it before the transistor batteries died. I didn’t “interpret” Hotel California; I hummed its guitar outro at parties and prayed someone knew the harmony. Don McLean’s American Pie (1971) was more than a song. It was a eulogy. Buddy Holly had died in a plane crash in 1959, “the day the music died,” but what McLean mourned was larger. He was writing about the loss of optimism, the way the jukebox America of Holly and Elvis gave way to the darker age of Vietnam, assassinations, and acid. His Jester was Bob Dylan, who “stole the thorny crown...
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The Science (and Sense) of Copywriting

Copywriting existed long before we started attaching graphs and behavioural theories to it. In the old days, it was just called writing that sold. Today, it is described as a blend of psychology, linguistics, and marketing strategy. The modern copywriter has to be part storyteller, part analyst, and part psychologist which is a nice way of saying poor souls like me must make poetry out of a PowerPoint brief. Across history, words have shaped belief long before they sold brands. The parables of Christ, the dialogues of Krishna in the Gita, the Buddha’s calm clarity, Kalidasa's magnum opus Meghdoot all used language to persuade without pressure. They appealed to reason and emotion with a simplicity that still moves hearts. The principles that guide modern copy — clarity, rhythm, empathy, and relevance — were already perfected in those ancient texts and beautiful stories. Copywriting may serve commerce today, yet its spirit comes from something older and nobler: the art of reaching th...
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Pop Culture: India’s Fastest-Growing Language

Once upon a time, pop culture in India meant movie posters outside Plaza or Kohinoor in Dadar, Regal-Eros-Sterling-Metro quartet in South Mumbai, Rang Bhavan live shows, Lata Mangeshkar on Vividh Bharti, and that Saturday Date night show on All India Radio that played Elvis, The Carpenters, Pat Boone, and Connie Francis. It was slow, shared, and survived through word of mouth. Today it moves at the speed of Wi-Fi. The conversation never stops. It only changes screens. For years, the language of pop culture felt like a Western echo, adjusted for Indian sensibilities and around the maska pav-vada pav-kheema pav janta. It was harmless fun, not social commentary. That has changed. It now defines how we dress, talk, and even think. It decides what is aspirational and what is outdated. It sets the tone for how we view gender, politics, and power. The news may tell us what happened. Pop culture tells us how we feel about it. I’ll admit, there was a time when I thought “trending” was a new cut...
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Life, when counted in weeks, tells a story differently.

 Over 3,575 weeks have passed since my first breath in Dadar and inside them are about 2,360 weeks since Alka and I first crossed paths. Nearly 1,982 of those weeks have been as husband and wife. Each one carrying its own weight, its own gift. Before those married weeks began, we had already stood together through storms. Emotional storms that made us question our own courage. Financial storms that left us unsure of tomorrow. We stayed through all of it. Then Dubai happened. That single turning of the page changed the story. Our weeks filled with good life, beautiful home, travel, laughter, friendships across continents, and the joy of living larger than we had ever dreamed. Not all weeks were easy. Some stretched painfully, in hospital corridors and in nights after Alka’s stroke. Some vanished before we could catch them—airports, deadlines, hotel rooms, snow, seas and sand dunes. A few remain timeless. The registrar’s office where a borrowed garland crowned our vows. The afternoon...
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