In my city: a cultural code of young indians

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Indian society has been facing many changes during the last 20 years, specially due to the country’s opening via the economic liberalisation. More than make many new goods and services accessible to indian citizens, the liberalization also opened the minds of indians.

As Dheeraj Sinha describes in his book ” Consumer India – inside the indian mind and wallet“, indian culture have been guided traditionally by values like spiritism over materialism, substance over surface, correctness over opportunity; which reflect the dominance of the brahminin (the  highest group of caste, responsible for the custody of religious sacrament) mindset in indian society.

But along the economic liberalization process, the consumer market development have been finding in the kshatriya (the group of caste related to the warriors) mindset a good space to be supported for, as all the social and cultural changes that emerged in India in last 20 years. Upon the kshaytria mindset, indian society has been hosting values like competitiveness, glory, honour, success, action; possible to see in the way that brands and companies communicate with their targets, specially the youngest.

It doesn’t mean that indians, and the young indians, are ignoring their heritage and traditions. Anyway! Young indians are proud – even more than previous generations – of their country, traditions and culture; facing a context full of changes and opportunities not experimented by the older generations.

As example of these oportunities, it’s evident the sensation among many young indians the possibility to take responsibility on their destiny, to achieve their own dreams; in a way in which the concept of karma has been interpretated from a passive perspective to an active one. The idea that is possible to change the own destination through individual actions is one of the most important cultural codes to understand the New India.

That’s the point! With the opportunities not enjoyed by previous generations, young indians also want to enjoy what their parents and granparents could not do: to live their lives, to break the barriers of birth, to achieve their dreams.

One of the many examples of this cultural code is the bollywood hit “In my city”, the first single of Priyanka Chopra. Its lyrics describe a world (my city) where any person can live his/her dreams without any worries, as expressed on the lines “(…)Everybody’s welcome here/Everybody welcome to my city/We ain’t got no worries here/I know you’re gonna like it in my city(…). And the same kind of message can be seen in other recent bollywood movies, transmiting the possibility to make a journey from ordinary life to a success life, no matter as a star or celebrating personal achievements.

Born in a context of economic growth and political ascension of India worldwide, young indians demonstrate the same enthusiasm and energy to bring their own dreams into reality. As a consequence of this structural change, companies, brands and institutions have to provide a platform where the youngest can fulfill their dreams and necessities, as it’s possible to see in national cultural icons like Bollywood.