Mumbai: The Asian Federation of Advertising Associations (AFAA) held their first executive committee meeting at Kuala Lumpur on 22nd May 2012.

Newly elected Chairman of AFAA Pradeep Guha said ?there was a sense of purpose and urgency at the meeting?.

Following its new mandate the Executive Committee of AFAA has planned out a slew of initiatives that would be rolled out in the months ahead.

The first one is a skills re-orientation initiative that would be held in September in Kuala Lumpur where young professionals would be exposed to a program that has been carefully crafted keeping in mind the needs of our profession. The Advertising Council of India (ACI) which represents India on the AFAA International Council would be setting in motion a process to send three young professionals representing advertising, media and marketing respectively to attend
this program.

There would be a master class conducted by senior professionals with 30 students from countries all over Asia. This would provide a unique cross-cultural flavor to the program which would benefit the participants enormously.

Mumbai: ESPN STAR Sports scooped six awards at the PromaxBDA India Awards held last week in Mumbai, highlighted by a complete sweep off of sports categories with its Formula One 2011 "Elements" campaign winning two Gold awards for the Best Sports Campaign and Best Sports Promo, while the Wimbledon 2011 and Barclays Premier League campaigns won Silver awards for the Best Sports Promo and the Best Sports Campaign respectively.

In addition, ESPN STAR Sports secured accolades in highly competitive non-sport categories, clinching two Silver awards for the Best Script and the Best Promo Not Using Programme Footage categories for the Wimbledon 2011 and Champions League T20 "Clocks" campaigns respectively.

This continues the winning streak from its haul of 11 awards from PromaxBDA India, PromaxBDA International and PromaxBDA Asia last year, and highlights ESPN STAR Sports? continued commitment to on-air promotional excellence across various categories, heightening its reputation as one of the top awarded organizations in Asia.

Said Paras Sharma, ESPN STAR Sports? Vice President of Marketing and Communications: "It is indeed very pleasing to win these awards and getting our work recognised by our industry peers. What makes this success even more gratifying is that it has been achieved in tandem with various business objectives, and it continues to be our focus to meld creativity with commercial goals."

The PromaxBDA India Awards recognize excellence in on-air promotion, branding and advertising across India, Pakistan and Bangladesh. All the promos have been conceptualized and produced by ESPN STAR Sports.

Best Sports Promo

Best Sports Campaign

Best Script

Best Promo Not Using Programme Footage

MUMBAI: Asia?s No. 1 sports content provider, ESPN STAR Sports (ESS) is pleased to kick-off its celebration of women in sports for International Women?s Day 2012 (8 March).

To commemorate and highlight the important role women play in sports today, ESS will be paying tribute to female athletes through a mix of special TV programs, a week-long feature on Score Tonight and a new website showcasing the best of women in sports. In addition, ESS is running a series of promos with its top female presenters to raise awareness of the importance of International Women?s Day amongst its viewers in 24 countries.

Said Paras Sharma, Vice President of Marketing and Corporate Communications, "Women play an invaluable role in today?s global sports industry, as well as in inspiring girls and young women to participate in sports, which has profound individual and community benefits.

"As Asia?s largest sports content provider, we feel strongly that International Women?s Day (IWD) presents the invaluable opportunity to celebrate and highlight the critical role women play in the world of sports to our broad viewership across Asia.

"While the world celebrates International Women?s Day on 8th of March, we at ESPN Star Sports believe in celebrating women every day. We are pleased this March to showcase top female athletes through a mix of special programs, features, promos, columns and online, as a dedication to women in sports and their incredible legacy."

ESS has developed a special website for its March IWD celebration. Espnstar.com/iwd will showcase special IWD columns, programming, Q&A with ESS? female presenters, editorial pieces, image galleries and more.

In addition, from 5-9 March, STAR Sports? Score Tonight will be celebrating female athletes with inspiring stories on women in sports and by having it mascot Melvin, transform into Melvina for the week. ESS will also be showing over 20 hours of special dedicated programming on ESPN and STAR Sports highlighting great matches and moments of women in sports, as well as features on top female athletes from 8-15 March.

Visit espnstar.com/iwd to check out ESS? International Women?s Day showcase including: TV schedule, columns, editorial pieces, photo gallery and videos.