Gutenberg Wins Gold in PR Asia Awards for 2018

Gutenberg Wins Gold in PR Asia Awards for 2018

Gutenberg

MUMBAI: Gutenberg, an award-winning global and integrated digital marketing communications firm, has been named a gold winner in the Public Affairs category by PR Awards Asia, an organization celebrating the most outstanding, inspired and successful campaigns, individuals, and companies in Asia-Pacific’s communications industry. The firm won for its “Bharat Yatra” PR campaign for the Kailash Satyarthi Children’s Foundation (KSCF), an organization dedicated to eradicating child labor and child exploitation around the world. 

KSCF, led by its founder and Nobel Peace Prize recipient Kailash Satyarthi, organized Bharat Yatra, the largest march in India for child safety, from August thru October 2017.  The “Yatra” (march) was an important part of a five-year long global ‘100 Million for 100 Million’ campaign in which youth were change makers for a child-friendly world and all those involved worked toward building a common consensus to end all kinds of violence against children, especially sexual abuse and child trafficking. The march, which was also attended by the President of India Ram Nath Kovind, had an estimated 1 million participants, covered 11,000 kms, and crossed over 22 states in 35 days. 

On winning the award, Harjiv Singh, Gutenberg founder and CEO, stated, “We are extremely honored to receive this award and to further showcase Gutenberg’s expertise in spearheading effective, comprehensive and streamlined PR campaigns in many different areas.” Singh added, “Also, this award is especially important to us due to it being won for such a timely campaign with such an important purpose – making changes across India by saving 2 million childhoods every year.” 

Says Bidhan Chandra, Executive Director, Campaigns, Kailash Satyarthi Children’s Foundation (KSCF) “We are proud that our campaign, Bharat Yatra, has received international recognition and won the prestigious award.  The Bharat Yatra was the largest mass movement which saw active participation of people from all walks of life including government, judiciary, corporates, educational institutions, media, religious leaders and civil society. Led by child survivors, the Bharat Yatra was a clarion call to end violence against children, especially child sexual abuse and trafficking."

Gutenberg’s PR initiatives extended across both traditional and non-traditional media for Bharat Yatra, resulting in the following for the march:

•    40 million children and 500 million Indians reached in total 
•    Coverage by over 4,000 India national and international media outlets for television, print, online, and radio
•    An estimated 100 regional media interviews across 22 states
•    Over 400 feature stories in 35 days 

In its entirety, Bharat Yatra’s 2017 march had many impressive accomplishments, including: 

•    Madhya Pradesh passing a bill for the death penalty for child rapists 
•    Telangana declaring Karimnagar a child friendly zone
•    Andhra Pradesh announcing a global policy institute to formulate an environment for the protection of children in India
•    Karnataka setting up a dedicated court to fast-track cases related to child abuse
•    Punjab being declared a model state for childhood 
•    The Union Cabinet clearing the Trafficking of Persons Bill [Prevention, Protection and Rehabilitation Bill] 2018

PR Awards Asia is the foremost event in the Public Relations industry’s calendar, attracting sponsors from both the sector itself and the suppliers that serve them. The judging is led by leading professionals from the in-house ranks, as well as senior agency executive utilizing a demanding set of criteria.