 "Creative call to India's past at Goafest")
Swami Parmatmananda Saraswathi, founder of Chennai-based educational institutional Arsha Vidya Mandir, spoke about how India was the land governed by dharma and sense of duty and how our ancient culture and rituals could help harness our creative energies.
D K Hari and Hema Hari, the husband and wife founders of Bharath Gyan, a Bangalore-based organisation that supports learning of ancient Indian culture, drew attention to the country's huge repository of centuries-old knowledge. Ajay Chaturvedi, founder and chairman of HarVa, a start-up focused on skill development, community-based farming and microfinance in villages, alluded to ancient texts such as Bhagavadgita to highlight how our cultural heritage could help fire admen's imagination.
Amid this call to return to history and heritage to stand out in a cluttered environment, Rajan Anandan, vice-president and managing director of Google India, was the forwardlooking one, emphasising the use of technology to distinguish oneself in a complex and ever-changing communication world. Citing instances such as the use of Google Hangouts by world's largest two-wheeler maker Hero MotoCop or fashion e-commerce player Myntra (which recently merged with rival Flipkart) and the use of Google Glass by L'Oreal during the Cannes Film Festival 2014, Anandan highlighted how technology could help enhance consumer engagement. Anandan said wearable gadgets would constitute the next wave of devices in India, predicting India might have about 200 million such devices in only four years.
"In itself, the category could be a major disruptor to the way we communicate and also be an addendum to the number of devices we already carry," he said. According to Anandan, with wearables gaining commercial acceptability, consumers will soon step into a world of "myriad devices".