‘P&G Shiksha’ was launched in 2005 with the vision of providing means to education for underprivileged children in the country. Over the years, P&G Shiksha has evolved into a 360-degree, holistic education initiative targeting communities across the country, aiming to improve children's learning outcomes by strengthening educational infrastructure, remediating learning gaps, and empowering marginalized groups through education.

OBJECTIVE: 60 million children, feel left behind in class because of their inability to cope with their school curriculum. Many of them eventually drop out of school. This has led to a ‘learning crisis’ in India, which is going unnoticed. Our aim this year is to make this #InvisibleGap in learning visible, by creating awareness and providing on-ground remedial learning interventions.

With this thought-provoking film, we wanted to encourage a larger audience to take cognizance of the issue and take meaningful actions to bridge the gap in children around them.

All the children who were cast as school children in the film were local kids from Mumbai and its surrounding areas, most of whom attend government schools. They were already familiar with the environment we aimed to depict in the film.

The main character, the little girl who played Bindiya, was chosen after auditioning more than 150 girls from Mumbai and nearby cities. We wanted the protagonist, Bindiya, to be a character that people would instantly connect and fall in love with. It was crucial for the audience to be able to empathize with her.

In a similar vein, when we were casting the role of the teacher, we prioritized finding an actor with a background in teaching. This attribute would enable them to convincingly portray a range of emotions, especially during the crucial scene where the teacher discovers the true reason behind the little girl's concealment.

Within 2 weeks of launch, the film garnered - 24. Mm, views on YT, 17Mm on social and 91.9Mn impressions across social channels. Our social listening tool quotes a 96% positive sentiment on #invisiblegap. Several A-list Bollywood and lifestyle celebrities such as Shefali Shah, Sanjeev Kapoor, and Shreyas Iyer joined our endeavour in spreading awareness of the #InvisibleGap by highlighting their individual stories of how they struggled to cope with school curriculum and felt left behind. The conversation was soon joined by people across the country from all walks of life where they shared their own struggles with learning.