Call for creative digital proposals for UK-India 2017 from the British Council. T0 be eligible to apply, you must be based in the UK or India and have a track record of developing new digital projects or experiences that have successfully reached new audiences. Five projects will be selected for seed funding followed by a number of full commissions.

In 2017, the UK and India will celebrate a major bilateral year of cultural exchange. India and the UK have a long and rich history. The India – UK Year will enrich relationships at all levels of society, their institutions and government, building a shared future for generations to come.

This is the culmination of a five-year British Council programme to introduce a new, young, Indian audience to the best of contemporary UK creativity. We want to present the UK as a diverse, creative and contemporary country and reach a large audience across India during 2016 and 2017.

THE AIM

We have ambitious targets for our online audience – 10 million people in 2016 and 50 million people in 2017. In order to meet our ambitions, the British Council is looking for brilliant, creative, digital ideas.

Projects can have any theme but must:

• Have creativity and culture at their heart.

• Be intended for an audience primarily in India, though they can have a wider reach than this.

• Respond to the aims and outcomes in the background section below.

In order to be eligible to apply, you must be based in the UK or India and have a track record of developing new digital projects or experiences that have successfully reached new audiences (though not necessarily at this scale before).

WHAT WILL THIS LEAD TO

Five projects will be selected for seed funding of £10,000 each by the end of July. In return for this seed funding, we would like to see a prototype or proof of concept of your project that we can test with potential audiences in September/ October 2016. Following user testing in the autumn, we will make a number of commissions based on potential audiences and costs of the projects. Full commissions must launch during 2017.

DEADLINE

Applications are due by 08 July.

For full background and application details, please download our open call briefing here from the website.

Image: © Participant in the British Council's Casade_ZA 2015 programme, South Africa. Courtesy onedotzero. Photo: Jody Brand