A COLORful tribute

Channel unveils painting by artist Preeti Dmello and Rakesh Patnaik- a gift on its first birthday.

On its first birthday COLORS, Viacom 18’s flagship Hindi general entertainment channel had a celebration so grand that it involved literally the entire nation! In a party that involved people from over fifty cities, the channel did it all, cut cakes, met friends, spent time with COLORS fans and spread some good birthday cheer by adopting schools in partnership with iDiscoveri. Now, after spreading cheer across the country, the channel was in for a big surprise back home in Mumbai where a special painting created especially for the occasion by Preeti Dmello and Rakesh Patnaik awaited them.

Preeti Dmello and Rakesh Patnaik, inspired by the channel and its simple yet effective stories that have changed the face of Indian television, created a stimulating painting as a tribute to COLORS. A painting that embodies the rousing journey of the channel from its awkward first steps to today’s confident strides. The artist’s insight comes from the essence of the channel that dwells in providing meaningful entertainment through exciting new concepts and stories that reflect realities of life from rural and urban India. The painting was unveiled at the Mumbai office of COLORS amidst much fanfare by the representatives and the stars of the channel.

Discussing the painting, artist Preeti Dmello said, “Colors is a refreshing change from the saga of saas-bahu stereotypes that we endured for many years. Watching Colors remind me of a colorful mosaic of our country and its success shows that the TV watching audience has a thinking brain and a conscience. The amazing thing is that it manages to deal with contentious traditional issues in a modern context and thereby promote social change in a manner that is palatable even to the urbanized, educated audience. It is to Colors’ credit that Issues like child-marriage and female infanticide, which were hardly ever on the radar, are today discussed as issues that need to be eradicated– Colors is a harbinger of change. The painting represents a montage of the endeavor being made by the channel– it’s like a moment in time in this journey of change!”

Accepting the present, Rameet Arora, Marketing Head of COLORS said, “This painting is a symbol of our journey that we have charted over the past one year. It marks not only our first anniversary but also serves as a reminder for all those incredible times that we have had while working on the shows here. This great honor that Preeti has bestowed upon us brings me great pleasure and I would like to offer my sincerest thanks to her for this gesture. And I would also like to thank all our viewers for making us what we are today for without them our journey would seem incomplete. We still have miles to go and it is love and appreciation from our audiences and people like Preeti Dmello, that the journey becomes worthwhile.”

Present during the unveiling of the painting were COLORS stars Anandi (Avika Gor), Sugna (Vibha Anand), Baby Krishna (Dhriti Bhatia), Vinay (Vishal Gandhi) and Bindiya (Richa Soni), Ichcha (Sparsh Khandchandani) and Tapasya (Ishita Panchal) and Ammaji (Meghna Malik). The stars, along with unveiling the painting also signed their names on it to give it the official COLORS seal. The channel was running a special ‘Shukriya India’ campaign to commemorate its first anniversary which began in June and was running through the better part of July. - Sampurn Media