Okay, so maybe a six-metre high replica of the Taj Mahal floating down the Thames is a tad clichéd. But the objective behind the recently-concluded India Now festival, as articulated by Mayor Ken Livingstone, was to engage Londoners with a truly representative slice of modern day India.
According to Mark Prescott, cultural advisor to the mayor, the three-month long extravaganza attracted over 1.5 million visitors. Next up -- the Trafalgar Square dance festival to mark the occasion of Diwali.
"Asian television broadcasters are fighting fiercely over rights," laughs Prescott.
2007 is the year that marks the peak of recent economic and cultural inter-activity between London and India. London Unlimited, the branding arm of London City, with an annual marketing budget of £20 million, is spending five times the average marketing expenditure to engage with Indian audiences this year. It is not hard to see why. 2006 saw a record 212,000 tourist arrivals from India.
And those tourists spent an average of 14 nights in the city, making them the longest staying. The principal reason, though, is that for the first time, last year, Indian tourists outspent their Japanese counterparts, spending £139 million.
"London is terribly serious about India," says James Bidwell, CEO, Visit London, the official visitor organisation.
Bidwell and Prescott were in India with Lord Digby Jones, UK minister of state for trade and investment, for a UK-India seminar on partnering in globalisation. Indian business investors are currently the London Stock Exchange's darlings.
And of course, they want to rival Switzerland and Italy as Bollywood's preferred European shooting location. Bollywood in UK is a $28 million industry annually. Currently 40 movies are filmed in the UK each year, according to Bidwell. But they want the interaction to extend across the value chain of production.
For London Unlimited, India is today what saturated markets like the US, China, and Japan were in the past. And while Livingstone may not make an appearance year after year (he is scheduled to lead a 100-member strong high-profile delegation to India in the end of November), Bidwell indicates that they intend to sustain investment in India and measure the metrics of returns on that investment.
"A sand replica of Taj Mahal has just made its way to New York City as part of the India@60 festival," says Prescott, "and isn't imitation the strongest form of flattery."
Image: A replica of Taj Mahal floats down the River Thames against a backdrop of the London Eye in central London. The visual spectacle was part of 'India Now,' a three-month series on Indian culture and tradition.
Reportage: Arati Menon Carroll (Business Standard) | Photograph: AFP/Getty Images
