Jatinder Kaur Tur of The Caravan won this year’s Chameli Devi Jain Award for Outstanding Woman Media Person of the Year at the Media Foundation Awards. The event, held at the India International Centre, New Delhi, on Friday, March 21, also saw the introduction of two new journalism awards – the Kamla Mankekar Award for Journalism on Gender and the Vishwa Nath-Delhi Press Award for Fearless Journalism.
Priyanka Tupe from BehanBox won the inaugural Kamla Mankekar Award while Rokibuz Zaman of Scroll received the Vishwa Nath Delhi Press Award. Divya Arya from BBC Hindi received an honorable mention for two of her video series 'Hum, Bharat ke Musalmaan' and 'Hindu Dharm: Mera Marm'.
The event also featured the 11th BG Verghese Memorial Lecture, delivered by Justice S Muralidhar. In his hour-long address, he spoke about the deteriorating press freedom in India, noting that “internet shutdowns have become routine.” He presented statistics illustrating India's decline in the World Press Freedom Index, where the country currently ranks 159.
“A truly free media needs an independent judiciary, and an independent judiciary needs a free media,” he remarked, highlighting the judiciary’s weakening role in safeguarding free speech. He also pointed out how criticism of the government is increasingly being labeled as “anti-national”, citing instances such as the crackdown following the BBC documentary, India: The Modi Question, and subsequent raids, the use of Pegasus spyware on journalists, and the recent ban on Vikatan, a Tamil magazine, over a cartoon depicting Modi and Trump.
Taking a dig at the mainstream media, he described it as not just “noisy” but a “chaotic cacophony.” He added, “Worse, there is a virtual news war out there on the Internet. Fact-checkers have a tough time keeping track of fake news and dealing with troll armies that deploy social media handles and bots – some of them created by the IT cells of political parties.”
“The big challenge is to keep the news free,” he further stressed and underlined that there was a need to keep news away from corporate sponsorships.
The Chameli Devi Jain Award, instituted in 1980, honours women journalists who demonstrate excellence and courage in reporting. Named after freedom fighter and social reformer Chameli Devi Jain, it has been awarded since 1982 to some of India’s most respected journalists, including Greeshma Kuthar, Ritika Chopra, Neerja Chowdhury, Sevanti Ninan, Patricia Mukhim, Pamela Philipose, Sunita Narain, and Nirupama Subramanian.
The Kamla Mankekar Award is named after Kamla Mankekar, a pioneering post-Independence journalist committed to gender justice. The Vishwa Nath-Delhi Press Award is dedicated to Vishwa Nath, founder of Delhi Press (which publishes The Caravan, Sarita, Champak, Grihshobha, among others), known for his fearless journalism and defiance of institutional power.
Awardees were selected based on five submitted stories, evaluated by a jury comprising journalists Rajesh John, Seema Mustafa (Editor-in-Chief, The Citizen) and Supriya Sharma (Executive Editor, Scroll). The foundation received 57 entries for the Chameli Devi Award, 54 for the Kamla Manekar Award and 44 for the Vishwa Nath-Delhi Press Award.
Stories that won them the award
Jatinder Kaur Tur – Chameli Devi Jain Award for Outstanding Woman Media Person of the Year
The religious paranoia behind Punjab's sacrilege killings
The men behind Amritpal Singh’s election campaign from jail
Army officers testify that two generals oversaw the torture and murder of civilians in Poonch
Why farmers in Haryana and Punjab disallowed the BJP and others from campaigning
Anger among Jammu’s business community imperils the BJP’s election prospects
Priyanka Tupe – Kamla Mankekar Award
Rural Job Scheme Has Yet To Benefit The Most Marginalised Women of Maharashtra
Rape Survivors From Nomadic Tribes Get No State Support, Compensation or Counselling
Despite Law, Caste Panchayats Still Run Kangaroo Courts In Maharashtra
Why A Dalit Woman Is Demanding A Cremation Grounds For Dalits In Her Village
Cost of Maternal Health Is Pushing Families Into A Debt Trap In Maharashtra
Rokibuz Zaman – Vishwa Nath Delhi Press Award
Why Assam’s Muslims see discrimination in state’s flagship scheme for the rural landless
‘No Muslim can win, now or in the future’: In Assam’s Barpeta, delimitation fears confirmed
In Assam, over a thousand Muslim families evicted from railway land – but not their Hindu neighbours
Why residents of Assam capital are not buying the chief minister’s claim of ‘flood jihad’
This report was republished from Newslaundry as part of The News Minute-Newslaundry alliance. Read more about our partnership here.