From the pitch to the billboard: Ranji batter who gave ads an Indian idiom

before he joined O&M in 1982, he had been a professional cricketer (representing Rajasthan in the Ranji Trophy; he was a wicket-keeper/batsman) and tea-taster. He studied history at St Stephens College, Delhi.

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In 2004, Pandey was made executive chairman of Ogilvy India, and in 2019, he was named the agency's worldwide creative chief. He transitioned to the role of an advisor to the agency in 2024 and remained on the Ogilvy Worldwide Creative Council. But what that steep career graph does not highlight is how Pandey, who passed on to that great billboard in the sky on Friday morning, changed Indian advertising.

He did this by making it Indian.

Not that others had not done so in the past - Alyque Padamsee did it famously with the value-conscious Lalitaji for Surf (Lintas) in the 1980s and not that Ogilvy under Pandey steered clear of the Western sensibility that permeated advertising back then (if not in themes, then definitely in execution) as evident in the Vodafone pug or the Dairy Milk dancer; only no one did it as consistently, and as well, as he did.

By doing so, he created an Indian idiom for advertising that has now become the norm. Given that, it shouldn't surprise anyone that he coined the most successful tagline for an Indian brand, in recent memory if not for ever, "Abki Baar Modi Sarkar" (This time, it will be Modi's government), for the Bharatiya Janata Party's campaign in the 2014 national election that saw it winning the first single-party majority this country had seen in 30 years.

The news of his death spread a pall of gloom on the ad world and tributes from friends, colleagues, political leaders and admirers poured in on social media. In his condolence message, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said on X that Piyush Pandey "made a monumental contribution to the world of advertising and communication. I will fondly cherish our interactions over the years."

In her post, also on X, finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman called him a titan and legend of Indian advertising who "transformed communication by bringing everyday idioms, earthy humour and genuine warmth into it."