MTV launches youth insights portal MTV Play.in

In a bid to capture the attention of its target audience, MTV, the youth channel from Viacom18 stable, has launched a new website, MTVPlay.in. The channel claims that the new online destination peeks into the lives of this fickle audience, their thoughts, and even their fears.

"The website design, the lingo and grammar, even the puns signify the attitude and ambitions of the young," the channel says. It will be an open network and knowledge share platform where one can get regular SMS feeds, newsletters and youth insights by clicking on the subscribe button.

MTV India head Aditya Swamy says, "With MTV Play, we work with a diverse group of young people on a real time basis, which keeps us plugged into what's happening with an 18 year old. And we are happy to share this knowledge with partners, friends and anyone else who might be interested." The project has been co-created along with a team comprising 100+ collegians across 10+ cities in India. The youth network can share their views through closed community blogs, wall posts, and videos. The insights will be backed by extensive research by Third Eye Research Agency and MTV Insight Studio. The website is an ensemble of The 'Youth Speak', a collection of observations and expressions from Youth life.

Raring to Grow

With two-thirds of the population under 35, the world's largest democracy can afford to dream. The average Indian is expected to be only 29 years old in 2020, as against 37 in China and the United States, 45 in western Europe and 48 in Japan. The dreams are taking concrete shape; it's what the world calls a demographic dividend.

Some facts  459 million is the number of Indians between 13 and 35 333 million is the number of literate young Indians 62 per cent of the literate youth live in villages 77 per cent of literate youth are interested in films and music, 72 per cent in news and current affairs, 59 per cent in religious and spiritual topics, 35 per cent in science and technology, and 34 per cent in environmental pollution 98 minutes is the time spent by youth on TV every day, 44 minutes on magazines, 32 minutes on newspapers and 70 minutes surfing the Internet 40 per cent of the literate youth are OBCs, 27 per cent are general castes, 23 per cent are SCs and 10 per cent are STs

In India, it translates into a growing number of literate youngsters, which is both a challenge and an opportunity. India has 459 million youngsters who were born after 1975, the year INDIA TODAY came into being, and just before 1997. These youngsters, from those who have just entered their teens to those about to pass into middle agedom, constitute the people who can and do lead the nation, in business, in arts, in politics and in society. Of these, 333 million are literate, which is 73 per cent of the total youth population. This population of literate youth has grown at 2.49 per cent between 2001 and 2009 which is good news for those who read, according to the National Youth Readership Survey (NYRS-2009) by the National Council of Applied Economic Research (NCAER). Television has not made a dent on newspapers as a source of information; being seen by 54 per cent as a source for entertainment and 22 per cent for news and current affairs; about 63 per cent of the youth read newspapers to gather news and information on current events; only 10 per cent read for entertainment. The Internet-accessed by only 3.7 per cent of the youth-is more of Entertainment Central than an information one-stop shop. It is used for entertainment 14 per cent of the time, for reading books 4 per cent of the time, and for searching for new book titles for 1.2 per cent of the time. It is accessed at Internet cafes in 46 per cent of the cases, at home in 23 per cent of the cases and at the workplace in 13 per cent of the cases. The interests of India's emerging leaders throw up a surprise. While 35 per cent care about science and technology, 34 per cent are concerned about environmental pollution. More expectedly, 77 per cent are interested in music and films, 72 per cent in news and current affairs, and 59 per cent in religion. "With 67 per cent of the literate youth agreeing to reservations for women in Parliament and local government, there is clearly a slow shift in attitudes in the next generation. The fact that so many were from villages and yet voiced opinions of this kind is very promising," says sociologist Dipankar Gupta.
This diversity is evident in the following pages where 35 achievers under 35 are profiled. From Mumbai's school dropout Ajjay Agarwal who began the fast-growing Maxx Mobiles as a Rs 5-lakh start-up to Krishna Mohan Reddy from Berhampur, Orissa, a selftaught dancer who started a group of mostly labourers to win the Colors reality show, India's Got Talent; from the talented, mint fresh National Award winning music composer Amit Trivedi to wrestling champion Sushil Kumar, they have shown determination, innovation and gumption to build their careers.
Many of their narratives echo what the survey shows, that there has been a general tendency on the part of the literate youth to move from rural to urban areas. Rural mobility for long has been confined to the working class but with the increase in demand for skills which require higher education, rural youth are no longer averse to moving out. This is apparent from 82 per cent of the literate youth in the villages being "matriculates or below" and only 6 per cent being graduates, driving them to look beyond the rural limits for their careers. The survey also shows that the average age of Indian youth completing their highest education level is around 15. Data shows that 76 per cent of the literate youth have not gone to college.
And more worryingly, the growth in the number of literate youngsters was more rapid in urban India at 3.15 per cent per annum than in rural at 2.11 per cent, which means that access to education inside India is still low. A clear rural-urban divide is also discernible, in that the proportion of youth with higher education attainments is relatively greater in towns than villages, and gender differences are stark. "The quality of the human resource is of paramount importance," points out Rajesh Shukla, senior fellow, NCAER, and author of the NYRS. The demographic dividend can become a liability unless the growth is made inclusive, notes Isher Judge Ahluwalia, chairperson, Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations. "The current GDP growth rate cannot be termed sustainable as a large chunk of society is not able to reap the benefits," she adds. This can become both an economic and social problem. Economic, because an additional 110 million youngsters are to be added to the workforce by 2020. They will need jobs, good jobs. And social, because of the diverse composition of this force-for instance, 40 per cent of the literate youth are OBCs, 62 per cent live in rural areas, and the biggest chunk, 23 per cent, is from south India.
But then the stories of struggle and of success in the following pages seem to suggest that what India's youth dividend imagines, it also implements.
This article appeared in the India Today magazine dated August 23, 2010