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For many years, young Indians’ career goals were guided by the limited options of stable jobs like engineering, medicine, or public service. Today, a new type of professional—the designer as a creative entrepreneur—is emerging.

This goes beyond just influencer culture; it marks the growth of an Orange Economy. In this economy, design thinking, visual storytelling, product aesthetics, and user experience are connecting individual talent to the global market. Design is no longer limited to studios or elite institutions, it influences how we interact with apps, cities, brands, and other entities.

The Orange Economy needs policy focus, similar to the financial planning seen during India’s IT transformation in the 1990s. This involves creating top-notch design and content incubators in Tier-2 and Tier-3 cities, providing tax breaks to innovative creative companies, and making sure financial institutions consider digital intellectual property and design assets as valid collateral.

To understand what design really means today and how designers are influencing the creative economy, The Hindu will host a webinar, 'Design careers: Opportunities in orange economy', on February 28, at 5:00 p.m. The panellists include: Prof. Pratul Chandra Kalita, Head, Department of Design, IIT Guwahati; Shweta Choudhary, Director & Founder, Centre for Originality, Design & Expression (CODE); Aditi Srivastava, President, Pearl Academy; and Gazal Kalra, Co-Founder, Nuuk. The webinar will be moderated by M. Kalyanaraman, Head, Education Vertical, The Hindu.

Register now for free to ask questions and interact with the panellists. The three best questions will receive a free online subscription to The Hindu.

Panellists

Prof. Pratul Chandra Kalita, Head, Department of Design, IIT Guwahati

Prof. Pratul Chandra Kalita is a Professor in the Department of Design and the School of Business at IIT Guwahati, where he specialises in Design Management, Design Methods, Systems Approach to Design, and Design for Development. His research focuses on strategic and systemic aspects of design, including product–service systems and service design, with applications that bridge design, technology, and management.

Shweta Choudhary, Director & Founder, Centre for Originality, Design & Expression (CODE)

Shweta Choudhary is an education entrepreneur and design academician with over two decades of experience across higher education institutions. A Doctorate in Architecture, she is the Founder of CODE Edu and InnovHer.

Aditi Srivastava, President, Pearl Academy

Aditi Srivastava currently serves as the President at Pearl Academy, with 30 years of professional expertise from academia, marketing, and entrepreneurship. Earlier, she was the Global President of International Institute of Fashion Design (INIFD).

Gazal Kalra, Co-Founder, Nuuk

Gazal Kalra is the Co-Founder of Nuuk, a D2C brand for home appliances. Before Nuuk, Ms. Kalra co-founded Rivigo, the logistics-tech unicorn. Her career also spans roles at McKinsey & Company and the World Bank in Washington DC. An alumna of IIT Delhi, Ms. Kalra holds an MBA from Stanford Graduate School of Business, where she was a Reliance Dhirubhai Ambani Fellow, and a Master’s in Public Administration from Harvard Kennedy School as a Fulbright Scholar.

(For any feedback or suggestions, reach out to us at education@thehindu.co.in)