(October 22, 2025) When British Prime Minister Keir Starmer led a high-level trade delegation to India this month, the goal was to deepen business and cultural collaboration between the two nations. Mumbai and London-based Civic Studios, a socially conscious media company incubated at the MIT Media Lab, USA was part of the esteemed delegation.
Founded by Anushka Shah and supported by philanthropic institutions such as the Gates Foundation, Civic Studios represents a new wave of purpose-driven storytelling. For the founder and CEO Anushka Shah, it was a defining moment. “Civic Studios was founded on the belief that entertainment can be a force for change,” she tells Global Indian. “Being part of this delegation reflects and strengthens our mission to connect the UK and India through stories that inspire and empower.”
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Nurturing UK–India creative collaboration
Founded in 2019, Anushka’s Civic Studios has rapidly become a bridge between storytelling and impact, known for content that entertains while sparking civic imagination and social engagement. The studio’s upcoming feature, Christmas Karma, exemplifies this spirit. It’s a joyful Bollywood-style musical reimagining Dickens’ A Christmas Carol directed by Gurinder Chadha, the Indian-origin British film director best known for the film Bend It Like Beckham. Featuring a star-studded international cast including Kunal Nayyar, Eva Longoria, Billy Porter, and Boy George, and financed through Indian investment for a British director of Indian origin, the film is a landmark UK–India creative collaboration, releasing globally this November.
Beyond cinema, Civic Studios is creating entertainment to engage and empower. “The studio has a growing slate of climate change media across multiple formats — children’s content through schools and edtech platforms, rural and community radio, social media for youth action, and grant-based incentives for climate messaging in films, television, and digital content. All these are aimed at providing action-oriented narratives around climate change.”
For Anushka Shah, whose vision is forged in the experimental, human-centered culture of MIT, Civic Studios is both culmination and continuation, and a step toward reimagining how media can inspire empathy, optimism, and action across borders. “Later this year her studio is set to launch a £1 million Climate Media Fund to support Indian and UK creators who integrate climate action into mainstream entertainment.”
Creative core at MIT Media Lab
Although Anushka grew up in Mumbai, her journey in storytelling began far from the film studios of Mumbai. After completing her bachelor’s at The London School of Economics and Political Science, and a Master’s in quantitative research at the New York University, she went to work as a research associate at the MIT Media Lab, an MIT-based interdisciplinary lab that promotes research by combining ideas from seemingly unrelated domains. “During my four years as a researcher at the MIT Media Lab, I was fascinated by how media and storytelling could influence public behaviour and civic participation,” she recalls.
Working at the lab, she found herself in a space that championed experimentation and human-centered design. “The Lab’s culture which was experimental, interdisciplinary, and deeply human-centered shaped a lot of my thinking,” she explains. “The Media Lab is a space where you’re encouraged to reimagine how things could work, not just how they currently do.”
That mindset became the foundation for her entrepreneurial venture, Civic Studios. Drawing from her work on an open-source AI-driven media analysis tool, Anushka began to integrate technology into storytelling. “A lot of my learning from the MIT Media lab around machine learning and AI is now driving our use of technology at Civic Studios,” says Anushka.
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Envisioning entertainment as a civic tool
Growing up in Mumbai, Anushka was acutely aware of cinema’s role in shaping national consciousness. “So much of my understanding of the past in India has come from watching Bollywood movies of the early days. Even with the dramatic portrayals, they reflected the cultural milieu of the time and continue to do so,” she reflects highlighting how one can track India’s changing history, emotions and culture through its films. “Whether it’s the Angry Young Man phase telling you about license raj or the 90s showing the rise of disposable income of the Indian middle class.”
For Anushka, this lifelong fascination with storytelling became both an artistic and civic pursuit. “Over time, I became equally interested in how audiences interpret what they see, what makes something inspiring versus alienating,” she says.
Civic Studios emerged from Anushka’s desire to merge entertainment with civic imagination. Its a concept that reflects her belief in the transformative power of stories. “We wanted to explore how storytelling could drive civic imagination — how films, shows, and digital content could help people feel greater agency, empathy, and optimism about their role in society,” she remarks.
Building a global studio with local soul
Since its founding, Civic Studios has grown into a global media company with offices in Mumbai and London, while Anushka is balancing her creative ambition with business acumen, and working across two continents. “It’s definitely a balancing act,” she admits. “Running a company means making sure operations, finances, and strategy are sound but at the same time, the creative and social purpose has to remain the north star.”
Her leadership style emphasizes trust and autonomy. “I’ve learned to build strong, autonomous teams so that each department’s creative, business, marketing, and research can thrive,” she says. “The hybrid setup across Mumbai and London helps us stay global in outlook but grounded in local storytelling.”
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Milestones that matter
Civic Studios’ portfolio reflects the versatility Anushka takes pride in. “There isn’t one single milestone, but rather the fact that we have a series of them,” she says, adding, “From our first short film Vakeel Babu, which was showcased not only on an OTT platform but also in law colleges across India, to Santosh, which we helped distribute in the UK and bring to diaspora audiences as a stark critique of the Indian police system, and now to our upcoming film Christmas Karma — a mainstream musical themed on race and immigration. I’m proud that we’re able to be Indian yet international, create both independent and commercial content, and work in short as well as long formats.”
Navigating challenges and sustaining purpose
Building a mission-driven company hasn’t been without its hurdles. “Any mission-driven company faces the tension between creative ambition, social intent, and financial sustainability,” Anushka notes. Civic Studios was initially self-funded, a rare feat in the media industry. Over time, it attracted both commercial revenues and philanthropic support, from institutions such as the Gates Foundation.
“Because we were building a new category that sat between entertainment and impact, funding was always tricky,” she explains. “However, the blend of commercial and social financing has allowed us to stay independent while scaling our impact.”
Anushka Shah presenting Best Director award at the UK Asian Film Festival
A new chapter of creative diplomacy
As Civic Studios represents the UK’s creative industries in India, Anushka’s journey has come full circle from the civic imagination of MIT to real-world global collaboration. Her studio stands as a cultural bridge between continents, proving that entertainment can spark not just emotion, but empowerment.
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