01, November October 2025: In a land full of global horrors, the very Western festival of Halloween has yet to truly make its mark in India. But this year, Candyman Sourzzz, ITC Foods’ irresistibly sour candy brand, is giving the festival an Indian makeover with its latest campaign ‘Candyman Sourzzz Presents: A Desi Halloween’, reviving the legends of Indian folklore with a playful sour twist.
Halloween across the world might be filled with vampires, werewolves, and spooky pumpkins, but India’s roots of horror go much deeper, hidden in eerie banyan trees, misty village roads, and haunted havelis. This year, Candyman Sourzzz is summoning homegrown legends Tangy Tantrik, Sour Sundari, and Meetha Khatkula to bring back the thrill of Indian-style horror, with a flavour-packed campaign that celebrates the brand’s signature tang.
The campaign unfolds through a series of engaging character introduction on social media, each revealing one of the three legends in a quirky, cinematic style – Sour Sundari, Tangy Tantrik, and Meetha Khatkula. The digital-first launch reawakens these forgotten Indian spirits inside a crumbling haveli until they rediscover their “flavour of horror” through Candyman Sourzzz, leading to an explosion of neon colour, nostalgia, and desi mischief.
Mr. Anuj Bansal, Vice President and Head of Marketing – Chocolates, Coffee and Confectionary, Foods Division, ITC Limited, said, “With Candyman Sourzzz, we’ve always aimed to make sourness fun and exciting for young India. This Halloween, we wanted to localize the thrill by celebrating our own folklore in a playful, modern way. A Desi Halloween reintroduces the ghosts and legends we grew up hearing about through fun, flavour, and nostalgia making Halloween uniquely Indian in spirit and taste.”
Ms. Suchitra Gahlot, National Creative Director, FCB India said Halloween is relatively new to India. But the idea of ‘Horror’ isn’t. We used the Bollywood Horror genre from the 90’s, as inspiration to get our candy-loving desi kids to celebrate Halloween, desi style. So aside from pumpkins, witches on brooms and skeletons, we wanted kids to also learn about horror imagery that is representative of our culture – in the form of Bhoot Banglas, Daayans, Bhoot Pret, Tantriks. We wanted ITC Candyman to become the brand that owns Halloween – culturally, visually and with a sense of fun. And we had so much fun doing this body of work too.”
To make the celebration even more flavourful, Candyman Sourzzz Halloween themed pack is available on Q-Com with exciting giveaway mask that can also be used as a candy bag for candy lovers in Bangalore.
Taking the Desi Halloween spirit to the streets, the brand has planned a series of immersive engagements from RWA activations to OOH innovation capturing the campaign’s vibrant characters, to GRWM (Get Ready With Me) creative assets featuring the folklore icons.
The campaign will also see influencer collaboration with content creators known for their spooky storytelling, all reinforcing the playful message.