'Kyoorius' about a fair trial for ad entries

The latest advertising awards brand is banking on its judging process to establish itself

Tables in long rows down the length of a hall at Nehru Centre, a prominent art gallery and exhibition centre in Mumbai's Worli, display print ads and posters, as TV screens in the hall wait to spring to life with video ads. The setting to showcase the entries to India's second industry-wide advertising awards, Kyoorius Awards, is for both its jury and the public.

Started by Rajesh Kejriwal, director at Transasia Fine Papers, and who founded Kyoorius Exchange that till now organised a design awards and published a design magazine, the Kyoorius Awards is looking to differentiate itself in its launch year on the basis on its judging.

After the discordant notes of scam ads as entries and unfair judging process reached a crescendo in last year's run-up to the Goafest, Kyoorius has its work cut out.

Agencies, which have stayed away from the Goa Fest this year have sent in entries for Kyoorius, such as O&M, BBDO, Grey and Creativeland Asia. And, Kyoorius is aiming at bringing in the best practices of its partner, D&AD (Design and Art Direction, a British educational charity for design excellence) that awards the coveted Yellow Pencil, to ensure the selections steer clear of controversies.

At 20,000 pounds (or Rs 20 lakh), Kyoorius has licensed D&AD's backend software that lets the judges select displayed entries for shortlisting (from which the nominations and the winners for the Blue Elephant and Black Elephant awards are chosen) on iPads. The system automatically detects if a judge has voted for work from his own agency and marks the vote as abstained from, and entries that atleast half the judges have voted for are moved ahead. As the entries move from shortlisting to nomination, onto the final round, jury discussions ensue in the three-day session. The initial entries were chosen after the Kyoorius team carried out background checks on each to ensure they were commissioned by the clients and used in some media or the other, rather than just a client signature.

Neil Dawson, jury foreman and partner at UK-based creative shop, Dawson Pickering, says, "The right work has got to win, else clients will lose faith in creativity and think it is just a pastime for creative talent. Sitting in a room an putting our hands up to choose winners won't help, discussion, and then private voting, would. "

Abhijit Avasthi, national creative director, O&M, who is on the jury, says, "The merit of an awards show depends entirely on the jury. It can't comprise people who are not well respected or have not done winning work themselves. Also, it is a good first step to have judges both from India and outside. Good work will stand a greater chance as the Indian jury members would be able to guide the others about the nuances in TV and radio ads."

While Senthil Kumar, national creative director, JWT India, and a jury member, thinks the global judges would bring in unbiased views, Sajan Raj Kurup, founder and creative chairman, Creativeland Asia, a jury member and who had been vocal in his protests against scam ads last year, says, "I had suggested to Goafest two years ago to open up the nominations online, atleast, before the awards night but no. There is no lobbying going on here and there's a credible mix of judges from large agencies, creative hotshops etc."

The judges based out of India are only too aware of their challenges. Graham Kelly, regional executive creative director, APAC, Isobar, and multiple award winner in digital advertising, says, "We will have translations wherever needed for the firangi judges. Anyway, the ad has to be pursuasive for its target audience and not just clever for an award jury." Dawson says, "While working in South Africa, on quite a few occassions locals have explained how an ad is good in their context, if seen differently. What is important and gets missed out in a lot of awards is the strategy behind the ad, what was its job, and if the way is an interesting one."

Kumar, whose agency has not entered Kyoorius, says Goafest remains the de facto national awards but Kyoorius has the chance to be the equivalent of D&AD awards, which focuses on the craft of advertising more than others.

With both partners being non-profit, an amount of Rs 40 lakh, including proceeds from the entries (Rs 7,000-12,000 per entry), would be ploughed back to spur training of young creative minds, says Kejriwal.