Beer, cricket, and a wonderful jingle...

Communication consultant & content specialist Ganapathy Viswanathan remembers how Piyush Pandey effortlessly blended creativity, camaraderie, and cricket to craft an unforgettable jingle for Crompton

by e4m Staff
Published: Oct 29, 2025 3:14 PM | 2 min read

Fresh in my mind is the time when Piyush wore two hats — Servicing and Creative. We, the client servicing folks, would often go to him whenever we needed to crack a Hindi script.

It was around March 1988, just as the main season for Crompton fans was about to begin. As usual, our client woke up at the last moment. They had some extra media budget and wanted to use radio. We had no spots ready, and they wanted a brand-new jingle.

I asked my boss, Mr. Cajentan Pinto, what to do. His reply came instantly:
“Just catch Shri Pandey ji…”

Fortunately, in those days Pandeyji was a bit free, and I managed to catch him in the lift. He gave me some time and asked for the brief. I told him, “It’s very simple — the fan sells on its name; there’s no great USP.”

Next question: “What’s the deadline?”

I said, “Recorded jingle on Monday morning.”

The brief was given to Piyush on Friday morning.

Saturday was an Ogilvy cricket match. I was a bit jittery about how we’d pull this off. The only clear instruction from Piyush was to book Acme Studio at Tardeo with Nathan as the music director — after the cricket match, of course. There was one non-negotiable condition: he wouldn’t miss the beer after the game.

True to form, Piyush guzzled his beer quickly and still made it to the studio on time. The jingle was written, composed, and recorded within an hour. The jingle was sung by Vinay Mandke a famous singer in those days.