Bahubali* Zimmedar toh Champion Superstar
Responsible (Strong) Men, (raise) Champion Kids

*(Bahubali is a popular film character. Translated literally it means a man with strong arms and figuratively it is a complete man.)

The campaign is a first of its kind addressing men to take part in the nutrition of pregnant and lactating women and children. It addresses the need for men to be responsible and equal participants in ensuring women and children are not malnourished.

In the districts of Udaipur, Dungarpur, Banswara, Pratapgarh and Baran, in Rajasthan Social and health indicators are low and children are born with a low birth weight. In the wake of Covid-19, work on the ground came to a standstill. Kaboom was approached to execute a digital campaign to shift attitudes and behaviours amongst the Pregnant and Lactating women(PLW).

Our target audience of lower income group women living in the media dark areas were not on any digital medium. Kaboom applied Human Centred Design (HCD) Research methodology to understand and define the key challenges on the ground, and culled insights to further understand the narratives around nutrition as woven in the key districts. Along with this was a study to understand media consumption patterns of the target audience.

The Insights were clear:
Men were the decision makers of nutritional needs.
They were on the digital devices and we needed to talk to men directly
BUT
Men took no responsibility towards their pregnant wives or children
Men didn’t know what they were expected to do
They had no role model to look up to
AND
They all love and revere the character of Bahubali

The new knowledge meant we had to devise innovative solutions to indirectly reach the pregnant and lactating women. It also meant the campaign had to address the greater evil that is patriarchy to ensure the narrative around nutrition is rewritten and it is not just the responsibility of the woman that children were healthy.

Therefore the narrative was to build a responsible man as a role model for the target audience. A man who they love and respect - Bahubali. This gave rise to a campaign addressing men in the most backward districts of Rajasthan and introducing them to the new Hero they could look up to – Bahubali. And from there came the now popular slogan:

BAHUBALI ZIMMEDAR
TOH CHAMPION SUPERSTAR
Responsible (Strong) Men, (raise) Champion Kids

The media mix for the campaign ranged from popular platforms like Facebook and YouTube as well as hyperlocal channels like MX Takatak and Moj.

Covid-19 continued to play havoc through the year and being on the field became difficult making co-creation largely difficult. Kaboom leveraged the partnerships on the ground and online sessions were conducted with health workers and they were trained to make videos and get relevant information from the field that was constantly fed into the campaign. This strengthened the focus of the messaging and ensured participation and ownership from the audiences.

The tone and visual language of the campaign was taken from the popular Bollywood style posters, true to Bahubali, which was complimented with videos of real people on the ground. This led to the creation of a web series that was entertaining and educational to ensure men not just understood their role in the family but also found clear solutions to the problems they faced.

The digitally led campaign garnered 5 million viewership with 1.2 million total watch hours being watched in areas with low mobile data coverage. The total impressions were 8.2 million with 4.6 million people reached. And most importantly with 1 million interactions with audiences from the targeted region on the campaign that helps shift attitudes and behaviours around participation of men in household chores and taking responsibility towards their pregnant wives and newborn kids.