Open Minds 2025: Soft Power

Banu Mushtaq, 77, Author, and Deepa Bhasthi, 42, Translator: Writing Resistance

Banu Mushtaq and Deepa Bhasthi are the first writer-translator duo from India to win the prestigious International Booker Prize. Kannada writer, activist, and lawyer Mushtaq’s Heart Lamp is both mirror and stick. She reflects the domestic lives of Muslim women and chastises society for their many struggles. The women in her stories could easily have been victims but she gives them agency in unusual and inventive ways. They claim their destiny by creating sisterhoods and sororities. The power of her stories lies in how she uses humour for subversion, even while she unpacks identity and faith, caste and class, power and oppres­sion.

The prize also proves Mushtaq is both a master of content and craft. A short story requires the depth of a novel and the brevity of a poem, and the fact that Heart Lamp is the first short-story collection to win the International Booker Prize proves that she has elevated the form. Heart Lamp is also the first Inter­national Booker winner originally written in Kannada and it is the first win for an Indian translator. Bhasthi’s translation ensures that the stories come to us not in stilted English but in a confident idiom of its own. It has been rightly hailed as “something genuinely new for English readers” as it expands the scope of English itself and our understanding of translation.

Allu Arjun, 43, Actor: Iconic Rise

A promotional event leads to a stampede, the release of his film makes box-office history by becoming the fastest film to cross `1,831 crore in revenue, and the mere announcement of a new film with Atlee breaks the internet. The Pushpa 2 star’s charisma, which became a national phenomenon with Pushpa: The Rise in 2021, appears undimmed. Affectionately known as Bunny, the Indian film industry’s highest paid actor keeps a low profile even when challenged by the state. Son of a film producer, nephew of star-politician Pawan Kalyan, cousin of superstar Ram Charan, and brother of actor Allu Sirish, he endorses several consumer brands, is the celebrity ambassador of the Pro Kabaddi League, and brand ambassador of popular streaming service Aha, founded by his father Allu Aravind.

Karan Johar, 53, Filmmaker and TV Host: Ahead of the Curve

He is the inscrutable host of Prime Video’s The Traitors; the face of his jewellery brand; and in his day job, a successful producer who works across the board, from Netflix to Prime Video. After a partnership with Adar Poonawalla, Karan Johar’s Dharma Productions has got a fresh lease of life as it ventures into newer territory with Neeraj Ghaywan’s stirring Homebound, which won many plaudits at the Cannes Film Festival. More than that, whether it is Poo from Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham… (2001) or Rizwan Khan from My Name Is Khan (2010), his characters continue to reso­nate in popular culture. As for Koffee with Karan, it never ceases to grow old, with camp intact.

John Abraham, 52, Actor: National Hero

Long an island unto himself in the agglomeration that is Bollywood, he has produced films he believed in, even if no one else did, like Vicky Donor (2012) and Madras Cafe (2013). John Abraham has held aloft the patriotic banner, most recently in his film, The Diplomat, which chronicles the Uzma Ahmed ab­duction case, and the forthcom­ing biopic on the life of supercop Rakesh Maria. He has been the fitness pin-up for a generation of men, and a worthy villain in movies ranging from Dhoom in 2004 to Pathaan in 2023. And he is a sport-fiend who put his money where his mouth was when he invested in the NorthEast United Football Club in 2014, which represents the eight states of the Northeast and competes in the Indian Super League. With his sudden outreach to Union minis­ters S Jaishankar and Jyotiraditya Scindia, expect more talk from him on issues of national interest.

Anant Ambani, 30 and Radhika Ambani, 30: Corporate Heirs: Couple with a Cause

In May this year, Anant Ambani, the youngest son of Mukesh and Nita Ambani, started his position as Executive Director at the $90.5 billion Reliance Industries Limited (RIL). He was already leading the charge at Reliance New Energy Limited and Reliance New Solar Energy Limited since 2021, a key area for Reliance’s future growth. Of the three siblings, he is the one most attached to Jamnagar, where his grandfather set up the Reli­ance petroleum refinery, having created an animal shelter there, Vantara, which was unveiled to the world in the run-up to his wedding in 2024. Now Vantara is expanding operationally through a joint venture with the National Zoological Park in Delhi. He has also kept up his spiritual work, most recently complet­ing a 170-km padyatra from Jamnagar to the Dwarkadhish Temple in Gujarat. With his wife, Radhika Ambani, he is also one half of a power couple every young Bollywoodian wants to be friends with.

Binging on India
Monika Shergill, 51, Vice President, Content, Netflix India

Two billion dollars of economic impact from Netflix India productions between 2021 and 2024, over 20,000 cast and crew jobs, and three billion hours of Indian content watched in 2024, with at least one Indian title in the global top 10 every week. TV veteran Monika Shergill is at the helm of Netflix India, which emerged as one of the most influential entertain­ment conglomerates in the country, getting India’s biggest mainstream stars on board for prestige projects and fan favourites. From Sanjay Leela Bhansali, who directed Heeramandi: The Diamond Bazaar to Kapil Sharma with The Great Indian Kapil Show, from Rana Daggubati in Rana Naidu to Imtiaz Ali’s Amar Singh Chamkila, she has also forged creative partnerships with Excel Entertain­ment and Balaji Telefilms.

Nikhil Madhok, 46, Director and Head of Originals, Prime Video & Amazon MGM Studios

Expanding beloved franchises such as Paatal Lok, The Family Man, and Mirzapur, telling the story of Bharat with Dupahiya and Dhootha, and promoting independent spirited movies such as Superboys of Malegaon and Nishaanchi through Amazon MGM Studios. Prime Video series characters have a tendency to be­come part of the lives of audiences, who demand their frequent return. Add to that pop-culture defining hits like The Traitors, Follow Kar Lo Yaar, The Rana Daggubati Show, and Rainbow Rishta, and in a TV career spanning 20 years, Nikhil Madhok has shown a deep interest in telling rooted tales. As he says: “We started thinking along the lines of ‘themes’ rather than only ‘genres’. For example, we have a theme around ‘women with agency breaking stereotypes’. We recently launched a horror show called Khauf—which deals with challenges women face when living in a big city, but on the surface, it is a horror genre show. Another insightful theme is ‘reconnecting with roots’. Many premium urban audiences living in cities can feel disconnected with their roots. So, stories that can connect them to their roots and show them a glimpse of a simpler life they have left behind resonate quite deeply as we have seen with Panchayat or Dupahiya.”

Leena Nair, 56, Global CEO, Chanel: Power Chic

It is no surprise that Chanel’s first Asian and first woman CEO was honoured with a Com­mander of the Order of the British Empire from Prince William this year. Under Leena Nair’s hands-on leadership since 2021, the 115-year-old company’s value has risen to US$37.9 billion, making it the second-most valuable luxury brand after Porsche, ahead of Louis Vuitton. It has 310 Chanel boutiques worldwide and its array of beautifully crafted goods are also possibly the most counterfeited in the world. Nair, who was Unilever’s first global HR head, knows the names of all 20,000 Chanel employees, and never fails to answer emails sent directly to her personal email. In the tough world of luxe living, in a brand owned exclusively by the secretive Wertheimers, she has shown the power of the connected CC logo.

Rashmika Mandanna, 29, Actor: Star Sensation

Nagarjuna has compared her to Sridevi, Chiranjeevi says she is her crush. Rashmika Mandanna, born to Kodavu parents, has delivered three back-to-back over ₹500 crore hits with Chhaava, Pushpa 2 and Animal. The young woman who made her debut as a college student in Kirik Party in 2016, has the perfect blend of tradition and modernity, playing the long suffering homemaker in Animal to the temperamental wife in Pushpa 2. Having acted with major male stars across languages, the latest being Dhanush, Mandanna is now ready to release an independent film focused almost entirely on her. With brand endorsements, real estate investments and 46.2 million followers on Instagram, the world is her oyster and more.

In the Arena: India at Play
Gukesh D, 19, Chess Player: The Boy Who Beat Time

There are prodigies and there are professionals. Gukesh D is becoming something rarer: a poet of control. One who has learnt not just how to win, but when to wait. The table shook in Stavanger. But Gukesh did not flinch as Magnus Carlsen banged it in frustration. At Norway Chess, the World Champion not only bagged a career-defining first classical win over Magnus Carlsen in Round 6, but also achieved a hat-trick of top-tier wins by defeating Hikaru Nakamura and Arjun Erigaisi too in classical play. Then in Weissenhaus and Paris, where the new freestyle for­mat tested intuition over prep, Gukesh met them with trademark monastic precision. It can be said that 2025 was the year he stopped playing to surprise and started playing to stay, clinching India’s highest sport award, holding his own at top events, earning breakthrough blowouts against legends, and show­casing adaptability across formats.

Neeraj Chopra, 27, Track and Field Athlete: True Grit

Last year, Neeraj Chopra missed out on the gold at the Olympics javelin throw event because he still couldn’t cross the 90-metre mark that had been eluding him de­spite the numerous medals, including an earlier Olympic gold. He finally cracked it this May at the Doha Diamond League when he threw his javelin to a distance of 90.23m. Yet it only got him the silver behind Julian Weber. But a month later he defeated Weber at the Paris Diamond League, winning the gold. Now that he has broken the 90m jinx, he will be raring to go for gold at the 2025 World Athletics Championships in Tokyo in September, something he won in 2023.

Gautam Gambhir, 43, Cricket Coach: Killer Instinct

It is easy to go unno­ticed in an era when the Indian team’s bat­ting sheet had names like Sachin Tendulkar and Virender Sehwag. Yet, Gautam Gambhir stood out in his own way. He was a dogged player, possessed a sharp cricketing mind, and was always up for a scrap, qualities that made him an Indian Premier League (IPL) legend and which today help him usher in a new era for Indian cricket as coach. Although it has only been a year since his appointment as head coach, the imprint of his style is present everywhere today. There have already been many highs, including the Champions Trophy and a phenomenal run in limited overs’ cricket. But also some crushing lows, in Australia and at home against New Zealand. Gambhir has also had to deal with a tricky phase of transition in Indian cricket. How he manages this and grooms the next set of Indian superstars will be his true litmus test.

Jasprit Bumrah, 31, Cricketer: The Game Changer

One way to look at Jasprit Bumrah’s impact on the game is to look at his phenomenal stats. The other is to look purely at the awe he generates every time the ball is handed to him. Every ball of Bumrah’s is an event, every ball a moment when the game can turn on its head. Although India had a mixed bag of results where many of its superstar batsmen flattered to deceive in the last one year, Bumrah was always consistent. He was the player of the series in India’s T20 World Cup triumph, where he picked up 15 wickets at an astonishing average of 8.26. Later in Australia, although India lost badly, Bumrah almost single-hand­edly turned it around for the team. He took 32 wickets across five Tests, the highest ever by an Indian in an away series, averag­ing just 13.06, and unsurprisingly won the Player of the Series there too.

Dinesh Vijan, 43, Founder and CEO, Maddock Films: Production Panache

His dad gave him two pieces of advice that have stayed with him over the years, says Dinesh Vijan, one of the most successful pro­ducers in Hindi cinema currently. “First, define what you stand for, especially if you’re not from the industry. That clarity keeps you grounded when the noise gets loud. Second, adapt, grow, evolve. You can’t afford to get stuck. The world, the audience, the stories, everything is con­stantly changing. The only way to stay open is to keep mov­ing forward.” He has shown that in spades, creating India’s first horror comedy franchise beginning with Stree (2018); producing the bloody-soaked Chhava (2025), this year’s biggest hit; and has built an ecosystem with some of India’s brightest young actors.

Shalini Passi, 49, Patron and Impresario: Fabulous Life

She is the star of a popular reality show Fabulous Lives vs Bollywood Wives, has authored a soon-to-be-published memoir, will soon host a high-fashion ball in Mumbai, and has received count­less awards from devoted fan girl organisations as well as swooning media houses. The art collector, artist, philanthropist and self-improvement enthusiast proves it is not too late to be glamorous and game-changing. From her six-inch heels to her animal-shaped bags, Shalini Passi has shown the power of manifestation, trans­forming herself from a South Delhi homemaker to national celebrity. And shown that behind the seemingly ditzy BFF of Gauri Khan and luxury label magnet, there is a serious art patron who has been on the Khoj Studios Advisory Board since 2012 and serves as a longstanding patron of the annual Kochi-Muziris Biennale.

Sabyasachi Mukherjee, 51, Fashion Designer: Authentic Style

He is the first Indian designer to collaborate with Estée Lauder, H&M, Bergdorf Goodman, Saks, Pottery Barn, Disney, Thomas Goode, Morgenthal Frederics, Printemps Doha and Christian Loubou­tin. Patrons of the brand include celebrities, royals, intellectuals, and achievers. Fashion designer, market pioneer, Shah Rukh Khan’s collaborator at this year’s Met Gala. As the brand has evolved, so has the mononymic Sabyasachi, helming a number of ini­tiatives, both non-profit and for-profit, including the Save The Sari project and the Sabyasachi Art Foundation, work­ing closely with artisans and artists on models of economic sustainability. With flagship stores in most major cities across India, he launched his first international store in New York in 2022. Over a little more than two decades, Sabyasachi has redefined In­dian fashion and design into a lifestyle firmly rooted in heritage, craftsman­ship and authenticity.

Tharun Moorthy, Filmmaker: Perfect Thriller

Not a man trying to fix the system. But Tharun Moorthy is documenting how it breaks. In Operation Java (2021), it was cy­bercrime and unemployed youths; in Saudi Vellakka (2022), an old woman is on trial for a slap that echoed for decades. And now, in Thudarum (2025), the Malayalam filmmaker has pulled Mohanlal out of megastar orbit and into the grime of grief, playing a taxi driver caught in the wreckage of an honour killing. The film is an unflinching revenge thriller that stares at the machinery of caste, guilt, and impunity. It broke records, outpacing most regional releases this year, even as it refused the dramatic pieties that usually justify murder. A Kathakali student, Moorthy’s realism is moral. He is that rare Indian director who builds truth patiently, and there­fore, commands attention.

Manu S Pillai, 35, Author: Exploring Identity

His new book, Gods, Guns and Missionaries: The Making of the Modern Hindu Identity, makes the important argument that Hinduism is not a monolith and that it has been influenced by various forces throughout history. Manu S Pillai’s initial focus is the European missionaries who arrived in India in the 16th century. The book then branches out to tell of a fasci­nating array of characters, from wander­ing Jesuits to ‘Native Luthers’. He tells the tale of storied figures like Raja Ram Mohan Roy to VD Savarkar. He paints them as humans, capable of heroics and foibles. It is a book that reminds readers that “India is a civilization raised up on astute compromises. It could be no other way, given the linguistic, ethnic, geographical and cultural diversity of the land. Keepers of the song and lore which shaped its national narrative confronted such dizzying contingencies that a de­gree of plasticity was integral to holding it all together.”

Jaya Asokan, 47, Director, India Art Fair: Art of the Matter

Every year the India Art Fair held in New Delhi arrives with greater pomp and fanfare. And every year the fair lives up to its potential and more. This is largely because of the steady leadership and pathbreaking vi­sion of its director Jaya Asokan. In the last three- four years since she has taken over as its director, Asokan has char­tered a course for the fair both bold and refreshing. Youngsters ar­rive in droves to take selfies, just as the biggest buyers and sellers arrive here to make deals. The fair is not only the marquee event of the Indian art calendar but it is now an event on the global art calendar too, and the credit goes to Asokan’s organisational skills, artistic acumen and business sense.

Rahul Mishra, 45, Fashion Designer: Floral Flair

Zendaya wore his saree, while Lisa of BLACKPINK chose him for the Oscar red carpet. The first Indian designer to be invited to showcase at the Paris Haute Couture Week champions slow fashion with traditional Indian crafts. The floral and other embellish­ments on his couture allows Rahul Mishra to build sustainable livelihoods for more than 1,500 artisans, which makes him one of India’s finest artistic ambassadors, and has seen Reliance Brands invest in him to create a new global prêt-à-porter label. All good enough for the French government to honour him with the insignia of Chevalier dans l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in 2023. And all this while upholding the philosophy of the 3 E’s—Environment, Employment and Empowerment—looking at luxury from the lens of participation, and not just consumption.

Ananya Panday, 26, Actor: Princess Annie

Known variously as Annie or ACP (Ananya Chunky Panday), she has gone from being a one-note joke to being one of Hindi cinema’s most exciting young talents. “It’s been a journey of a lot of learning—very importantly, about myself. When I started, I really wanted to be liked by everyone and would try hard to fit into what I thought people expected of me. Over the years, I’ve realised that being au­thentic is far more power­ful,” says Ananya Panday. Having negotiated the trolling that comes with being a child of nepotism, she has moved on from safe and some would say silly choice of films to do Gehraiyaan, where she was a cuckolded young woman; Kho Gaye Hum Kahan for Netflix, where she played a social media influencer; ditto in CTRL; a poor little rich girl in Prime Video’s Call Me Bae, and a pre- Independence lawyer in Kesari 2. She is the face of several brands, including India’s ambassador for Chanel, has 26 million followers on Instagram.

Namit Malhotra, 49, CEO, Prime Focus: Framing the Future

Ten thousand professionals in 24 cities across four continents and seven time zones, the integrated studio which includes VFX house Double Negative (DNEG) has done work on movies ranging from Tenet (2020) to Dune (2021) and Dune: Part 2 (2024). Beginning as an editing unit in his film producer father’s garage in 1995, Prime Focus has worked on Brahmastra (2022) and co-produced the forthcoming ‘Rama­yana’ by Nitesh Tiwari. The studio has won several Academy Awards, BAFTAs, and Visual Effects Society awards for films such as Interstellar (2014), Blade Runner 2049 (2017), and First Man (2018). Cutting-edge technology meets unimaginable creativity even as Namit Malhotra himself keeps his head down. From the company Brahma, which creates dig­ital duplicates to PFAMES which teaches animation skills, his eyes are clearly focused on the future.

Vidya Shah, 53, Musician: Tonal Shift

In an ecosystem obsessed with the next tune, she reminds us about forgot­ten voices from the past—right from the gramophone era to theatre to early film music. Vidya Shah is that rare performing musi­cian who is in the business of resuscitating history, note by note. From Gauhar Jaan and Janki Bai to Zohrabai Agrewali and Saraswati Devi, Shah restores their grain, their legacy and their public solitude with the intention of mainstreaming their voices. A trained clas­sical vocalist, Shah has long straddled the space between archival labour and aesthetic performance, putting up travelling shows on women musicians, the syncretic and acces­sible poetry and language of Delhi, and more. The sequel to her book on women musicians is set to be published this year, even as she works on releasing a podcast series interviewing senior musicians about their lives and art.

Manish Tripathi, 39, Fashion Designer: Indian By Design

From designing garments for Ram Lalla, the deity newly enthroned in Ayodhya, to crafting India’s cultural mission patch for astronaut Shubhanshu Shukla, Manish Tripathi has been tailoring the nation’s myth and modernity into a single, seamless fabric. Even as the Axiom-4 launch was delayed, the emblem lingered: a miniature cosmos stitched with symbols of India’s scientific pride and cultural depth—from Aryabhata and Gaganyaan to Jantar Mantar and Surya. At its heart, an astronaut’s helmet cradles the Indian map, evoking Hanuman’s celestial leap, while the loop of zero and infinity gestures towards timeless curiosity. Inspired by a postal stamp and eight months in the making, the patch is, in Tripathi’s words, “India’s fingerprint in space.” Tripathi’s signature lies in translation—between craft and couture, nation and cosmos, ritual and future.

Trinetra Haldar Gummaraju, 28, Actor: Crossing Barriers

She has learned to navigate rooms built without her in mind. In Kankhajura, Trinetra Haldar Gummaraju plays a trans woman caught in the periphery of a widening moral crisis. The role is not written for visibility’s sake; it is one strand in a darker weave. Early reviews describe her performance as “subdued” and precise, and Gummaraju has said her character is “tough for the world” but emotionally unguarded in ways that challenged her own instincts. The role marks her shift into genre‑complex storytelling. Gummaraju trained in medicine, not performance. She is the first openly transgender doctor in Karnataka and among the few who documented each unlit corridor of that journey. In Made in Heaven, she was cast as a trans woman, reframing the grammar of inclusion. In a country where trans characters have long been flattened into tropes, her role suggested something quietly radical— that trans lives need not arrive with italics. They can, instead, be written into the main sentence.

 

 

 

 

 

Anniversary Issue 2025cinemacricketentertainmentfashionSoft power