In July this year, we decided to completely stop the usage of the word “Regional” in any of our work, ranging from reports, social media messaging, media communication, etc. The usage of “Regional", to describe all non-Hindi Indian content, has, for many years, created a false binary, resulting in an inaccurate description of the Indian entertainment industry. In a country that has a rich and diverse content landscape, the word “Regional” has an unmistakable ring of condescension, subliminally cueing a hierarchical relationship between content from various language markets. With the language barriers and boundaries being broken, especially in the theatrical and streaming categories, there cannot be a better time to relinquish the usage of a dated word, and move to more inclusive nomenclature.

We have shifted our usage to “Language” instead. The term is neutral, and free of prejudice. The response to our social media post below, from July 18, has been heartwarming, with several stakeholders from Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, Malayalam, Bengali, Marathi, Punjabi and other industries wholeheartedly welcoming the move. We hope it motivates several others in the Indian Media & Entertainment industry to relook at the use of the term “Regional”.