Mumbai: The Advertising Agencies Association of India (AAAI) has issued a detailed clarification defending the integrity and transparency of its Lifetime Achievement Award selection process, stating that the award is governed by a structured, process-driven methodology and is free from bias.
The industry body said the Lifetime Achievement Award, originally instituted in 1988 as the AAAI Premnarayan Award and renamed in 2008, follows a rigorous nomination and jury evaluation process designed to recognise advertising professionals who have made outstanding contributions to the industry over several decades.
According to AAAI, the award criteria include more than 25 years of experience in advertising, leadership roles in organisations, contributions to industry bodies, ethical leadership, innovation, organisational growth, social impact, and overall stature as an industry veteran. The association also allows flexibility in exceptional cases where an individual has made a significant contribution to the advertising ecosystem.
The association said nominations are invited from all AAAI members through a formal nomination process. Once nominations are received, they are reviewed by the President and Secretariat before being presented to an independent jury in a comparative format to facilitate evaluation.
For the 2026 edition, the Board of Directors approved the nomination process in June, inviting nominations between 2 June and 30 June 2026. Five fresh nominations were received for C.V.L. Srinivas, Sandeep Goyal, Anupriya Acharya, Prasanth Kumar, and Santosh Desai, while five additional names—M.G. Parameswaran, Nakul Chopra, Ashish Bhasin, Tapas Gupta, and L.V. Krishnan—were carried forward from the previous year’s recommendations, resulting in a total of ten nominees.
AAAI noted that Prasanth Kumar and Anupriya Acharya, who were also members of the jury, voluntarily withdrew their names from consideration, leaving eight active nominees for evaluation.
Addressing recent allegations regarding the selection process, AAAI said there had been attempts to influence the outcome in favour of one nominee.
The association stated that Tanya Goyal had repeatedly approached the AAAI President seeking the award for her spouse, Sandeep Goyal, and subsequently questioned the transparency of the selection process. To address these concerns, AAAI said she was invited to join the jury on 30 June 2026, with access to all communications shared with jury members.
The association maintained that the names of jury members had already been published on its website following the first Board meeting in September 2025, rejecting claims that the jury composition lacked transparency.
Explaining the evaluation methodology, AAAI said jury members were asked to shortlist two nominees based on their individual assessment. The top three candidates were then discussed in detail before arriving at a collective decision through qualitative deliberation rather than a point-based scoring system.
According to AAAI, this approach is consistent with the practices followed by several established awards globally, where qualitative judgement is considered more appropriate than numerical scoring for recognising lifetime achievements.
The association confirmed that the jury recently concluded its deliberations and selected the 2026 recipient. The winner’s name will be announced after obtaining the awardee’s consent.
In response to criticism surrounding the process, AAAI said it has appointed an independent professional institution to audit the award selection mechanism to further reinforce confidence in the integrity of the process and dispel any allegations of bias or conflict of interest among jury members.
The association also said that although Tanya Goyal had initially sought participation in the jury, she later chose not to be part of the deliberations despite being invited.
AAAI expressed concern over recent media reports and comments questioning the credibility of the award process, stating that such allegations undermine not only the eventual recipient but also the volunteer jury members who devote significant time to evaluating nominees.
The association added that it remains open to improving its processes and welcomes constructive suggestions made in the broader interest of the industry, while emphasising that any recommendations should be free from vested interests.
