People Move · September 2026

Kanika Bains Appointed VP & Head – People & Culture at MSL India

Kanika Bains joins MSL India as VP & Head – People & Culture, bringing extensive talent acquisition and HR experience.

The appointment

MSL India, the public relations and integrated communications arm of Publicis Groupe, has appointed Kanika Bains as Vice President & Head – People & Culture. Based in Gurugram, Bains will lead the organisation’s people agenda, bringing extensive experience in talent acquisition, employer branding, hiring strategy and HR business partnering across the media, technology and consumer sectors.

A career spanning talent acquisition and people leadership

Kanika Bains brings extensive experience across talent acquisition and HR, with her career spanning organisations such as Edelman, Reliance Brands, Paytm and the Times Group.

Before joining MSL India, Bains spent more than four years at Edelman, where she served as Vice President – Talent Acquisition. She was responsible for managing end-to-end talent acquisition for India and working on strategies to streamline the organisation’s annual hiring process.

Her role at Edelman also included additional responsibility for priority hiring across Australia, Singapore, Malaysia and Hong Kong. Alongside talent acquisition, Bains was part of the organisation’s employer branding core team, contributing to initiatives aimed at strengthening the company's positioning as an employer.

Experience across Reliance Brands and Paytm

Prior to Edelman, Bains worked with Reliance Brands Limited as Head – Talent Acquisition from February 2021 to February 2022. She managed the Talent Acquisition Centre of Excellence and led the corporate TA team.

During her tenure, she worked on projects focused on digitising hiring processes, improving candidate experience and increasing interviewer efficiency, bringing a technology-driven approach to talent acquisition.

A major part of Bains' career was spent at Paytm, where she worked for more than a decade and progressed through several talent acquisition and HR roles.

She started with Paytm as Manager Talent Acquisition and subsequently moved into senior positions including Senior Manager Talent Acquisition, Assistant General Manager – Talent Acquisition and Deputy General Manager Talent Acquisition.

As Assistant General Manager, she worked with senior product, business and growth functions. Later, as Deputy General Manager, she led leadership hiring across business, product and growth functions.

Her Paytm experience also included roles such as HR Business Partner, Hiring Manager and Social Media Head, giving her exposure beyond traditional recruitment responsibilities.

Early career in media and corporate HR

Kanika Bains began her career in HR roles within the media industry. She worked with Bennett Coleman & Co. Ltd. (Times Group) as an HR Executive, followed by a short stint with TIMES OOH as HR Executive.

She later joined 94.3 MY FM, part of Synergy Media Entertainment Ltd. and the Dainik Bhaskar Group, where she worked as Senior Executive Corporate HR from September 2008 to July 2010.

These early roles provided her with experience in corporate HR and the media environment before she moved into larger talent acquisition and people leadership roles.

Her new role at MSL India

As VP & Head People & Culture at MSL India, Bains will lead the company's broader people agenda from its Gurugram base.

Her career in talent acquisition includes experience in building hiring strategies, leadership recruitment, employer branding, candidate experience and recruitment process transformation.

Her move into a People & Culture leadership role at MSL India represents an expansion from a career largely centred around talent acquisition into a broader people leadership mandate.

What this means for MSL India

Bains brings experience from both the communications and media ecosystem and fast-growing technology and consumer businesses. Her background at Edelman is particularly relevant to her new role at MSL India, given both organisations' presence in the communications industry.

Her experience managing talent acquisition across India as well as supporting hiring across international markets could also contribute to MSL India's broader people and talent priorities.

Hire Route Take

Kanika Bains’ career reflects the evolution of talent acquisition from a recruitment-focused function into a broader people and organisational priority. Her experience covers hiring strategy, leadership recruitment, employer branding, candidate experience and HR business partnering.

Her decade-plus experience at Paytm, followed by senior talent acquisition roles at Reliance Brands and Edelman, has given her exposure to different organisational stages and workforce requirements. Her international hiring responsibilities at Edelman further added a multi-market dimension to her experience.

Her appointment at MSL India marks a move into a broader People & Culture leadership role, where her talent acquisition background can be applied alongside wider people priorities across the organisation.

Hire Route will continue tracking the latest HR appointments, leadership movements and people developments across India and global markets.