Page 50 - Seniors Today - April Issue
P. 50
Once Upon A Time | Advertising
Bal Mundkur -
the Shining Star
The legendary Ulka founder left
a blazing trail through the world
of advertising, writes Prabhakar
Mundkur
Bal Mundkur’s favourite picture of himself.
Courtesy : Devika Chittiappa Rao
Bal crashed through the advertising Mundkur (now Mundkooru in the recent
atmosphere with as much bang as a meteor trend of renaming places in line with the
would. When he left DJ Keymer that would vernacular) is a little hamlet in Karkala
later morph into Ogilvy to form Ulka, he Taluk, Udipi district in Karnataka. The
became one of the first to break away to form Durga Parmeshwari temple located there
his own advertising agency. Ulka (Sanskrit was built circa 9th century AD. The
for meteor) was formed in 1961 with his Mundkur family itself is quite old and
wife Ann who was a copywriter and a few we have been able to trace our family
others in Sundar Mahal, the last building on tree for 10 generations. Originally the
Marine Drive before you take a left turn into Patels or village chieftains of Mundkur,
Vir Nariman Road at Churchgate. This year the family moved out first to Mulki a
FCB-Ulka celebrated its 60th year a legacy neighbouring town and then to Mangalore
left behind by one of the original Mad Men before migrating to other large cities.
of Indian advertising. Bal’s father BB Mundkur was an Indian
mycologist and plant pathologist. A Phd
from Iowa in 1947 he founded the Indian
Phytopathological Society. Although the
senior Mundkur passed away in 1952
you might find more references to him on
Google than his seemingly more illustrious
son.
Bal had a colourful life. One of the first 6
Indian cadets to be recruited into the Royal
The verdant village of Mundkooru Navy, Bal got posted in Scotland after a
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