#ShatteredNotBroken: Scarecrow & ideas@work celebrate resilience

Commemorating the 8th anniversary of the 26/11 terror attacks in Mumbai, two creative agencies – Scarecrow Communications and ideas@work – took a stance against terrorism and conveyed to the world that we, as humanity, can be Shattered, but Not Broken. 

India has seen several terror attacks over the years. While each of the attacks left a scar on the heart of every Indian, the worst among all was the 26/11 Mumbai attack of 2008. When 10 men associated with a terror group, carried out a series of 12 coordinated shooting and bombing attacks across Mumbai. The attacks, which drew widespread global condemnation, lasted for four days, killing 164 people and wounding at least 308. 

But, the point really is this. We may often get Shattered due to such attacks on humanity, but we have to show the world that our solidarity is Not Broken. And it will never be. 

To convey this metaphorically, this year Scarecrow Communications and ideas@work hosted a one-of-its-kind fundraising photography exhibition – #ShatteredNotBroken – A stance against terrorism. 

The photographs were captured by ace photographer Prashant Godbole, Founder, ideas@work. And they were uniquely framed with glass shattered by bullets and shrapnel. The subjects of the exhibits were real people who were directly or indirectly affected by the 26/11 attacks. People like the owners of Leopold Cafe, the announcer at the CST station, Kia Scherr (President, One Life Alliance) who lost her husband and daughter in the attacks, Bhaskar Kadam (Asst. Police Inspector, Crime Branch Mumbai) who caught Kasab alive, and so on and so forth. 

The exhibition was held at the Scarecrow Art Gallery in Fort, Mumbai. Public viewing of the exhibition, held on November 26 and 27 was managed by BookMyShow. 

The funds raised for this initiative through the tickets sold, donations received and the sale of the exhibits will be forwarded to the families of the martyrs of the recent Uri attacks through Ketto.org, a leading crowd-funding platform and fundraising partner for the event. 

The Campaign Flow 

The campaign was largely driven by social media, various collaborations, a few newspaper articles and word of mouth and was split into two phases – a pre-teaser phase and a teaser phase. 

As the campaign revolved around the stories captured by Prashant Godbole, the pre-teaser campaign was started with various posts on the official Facebook page of the initiative. The first post was Godbole’s picture of the famous dome of The Taj with a pigeon and simple message ‘#ShatteredNotBroken – A fundraising photography exhibition on 26/11 by Prashant Godbole’. 

The campaign evolved to his portraits, where the two agencies communicated through various posts that if Prashant Godbole can capture a profound message and an untold story so brilliantly with his portraits, imagine what he will capture when he shoots the survivors and eyewitness of 26/11. The message stayed consistent. 

A unique set of posts, called ‘Terribly Tiny Terror Tales’, were created. The stories of the subjects were told in a crisp and intriguing manner, using the unique shattered frames that were symbolic to the campaign. 

Closer to the exhibition day, a simple yet effective metaphorical video inviting people to the exhibition at the Scarecrow Art Gallery was released. 

On 26/11, people were encouraged to change their social media profile picture to a shattered picture, via a specially designed app, to join the initiative and take a stance against terrorism. 

With the creative inputs of Head of Facebook Creative Shop, India & Indonesia, Juhi Kalia, a Facebook Live broadcast was done with the survivors and in-house anchor, Nikhil Kerkar, of the #ShatteredNotBroken team, recreating the event timeline from the same locations at the same time of 26/11. Additionally, some FB Live broadcast was done with real survivors from the exhibition venue as well. 

Talking about the initiative, Prashant Godbole said, “The whole experience of meeting the survivors and brave police officers was life changing. It was amazing to see how there is no vengeance in their mind. They just want peace. They want to take this second chance they have got in life with gratitude and in turn help as many people they can. They want to send out the message of love to the world and they pray that this kind of thing never happens again. Photography is just the by-product here. I have personally realised how important life is and it is up to you what you make of it.” 

Adding to that, Manish Bhatt, Founder, Scarecrow Communications, and Scarecrow Art Gallery, said, “Even in the middle of the night, when someone asks me, which one or two pieces of communication created by you personally make your advertising career most meaningful? My answer so far is – in 2003, ‘Respect the National Anthem’ (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qb2cswoJSXQ) and in 2007, ‘Hostel - Eye Bank Association of India’ (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nhwIFbB5iuo). I want everyone who is associated with Scarecrow to create such meaningful communication in their careers during their stints with us. #ShatteredNotBroken is one such attempt dedicated to my team. The more you collaborate for such projects, the bigger they become. Hence, made it collaborative.” 

Juhi Kalia, Head of Facebook Creative Shop, India & Indonesia, said, “Relive the day with Live. This was a beautiful use of FB Live to help support the bigger initiative of #ShatteredNotBroken driven by Manish and his talented team. It was a series of live streams that mirrored in real time through the day, the fateful events that occurred when 10 shooters held Mumbai at gun point on November 26. Stories of survivors and eyewitnesses, one of whom still has a bullet lodged in her spine, were broadcast from all the locations of the attacks. An homage to the fallen and a resolve to never forget.” 

Credit List: 

#ShatteredNotBroken - A Stance Against Terrorism

An initiative by Scarecrow and ideas@work

Photographer: Prashant Godbole

Asst. Photographer: Shashank Lawate

Creative Agencies: Scarecrow and ideas@work 

Team Scarecrow:
Manish Bhatt, Sunil Gangras, Prasad Jindam, Sakhi Shah, Prashant Pawar, Prashant Patankar, Nikhil Kerkar, Gaurav Kumar, Shilpa Potekar, Divya Singh, Seema Kamath, Gargi Agarwal, Kushank Jain, Rahul Banerjee, Juee Ghatge, Leena Lobo, Uday Apkar, Niranjan Bambarkar, Srinivas Dasari, Vijay Sawant, Apurv Metange, Manasi Kapote, Kuldeep Lot, Ravi Kudiya, Arjun Girhe, Jay Kumar Kahar, Ashok Jadhav 

Original Creative Idea (Facebook Live) & other Facebook related advisory:
Juhi Kalia (Head of Facebook Creative Shop, India & Indonesia)
Parul Arora (Other Facebook related advisory) 

Digital Partner: Digit9
Ravi Jeswani (Founder, Digit9), Madhusree Sinha, Avanti Banerrji, Dipesh Raut 

Online Ticketing Partner: BookMyShow
Ashish Saksena (COO, Book My Show), Reshu Dubey 

Initiative Advisors:
Shona Urvashi (Filmmaker)
Mitrajit Bhattacharya (Publisher & President, Chitralekha Group) 

Fundraising Partner: Ketto.org
Rajiv Sobhani, Sheetal Shetty, Dev Jaising 

NGO Partner: One Life Alliance
Kia Scherr (President) 

Social Media Partner: Humans of Thane
Sameer Desai 

Print Production Partner: Comart
Fred Poonawala (Founder, Comart), Joseph Paul 

Photographic Print Production Partner: ideacreative.in
Baban Panchal, Ramesh Prabhakar

Film Production Partner: Shadows & Whispers
Shailesh Gupta (Director & DOP), Vikram Purohit, Rajan Mozal, Biju 

Film Post Production Partner: Splice Studioz
Ajay Tiwari (Founder, Splice Studioz), Augustine Noronha, Bhavya Shetty 

Event Coverage Photography & Videography Partner: Snapboy
Nagesh Panchal, Suresh Chavan