Stories behind the stories

To report on the plight of villagers displaced by the spate of power plants in Sonbhadra in UP,Chaurasia had to trek miles through difficult terrain and wade through waters contaminated with chemicals dumped by big companies into the area’s water bodies. But “the real challenge”,he says,was to get people to talk. “Big corporates didn’t say anything because they knew they were doing something wrong,and the villagers didn’t comment because they were too scared,” he says. In the end,Chaurasia didn’t just tell the “real story” but also made waves. A copy of his story even reached Rahul Gandhi and helped many unskilled workers from Sonbhadra get jobs.

Reporting in Hindi (Broadcast)

Umashankar Singh,NDTV India

In 2009,there was a lot of noise in the media about the Taliban. These stories were based on YouTube videos and showed how little the media understood Afghanistan. In 2010,Singh and his cameraperson Narendra Gudavali were sent to Afghanistan for a better perspective on the country and its many stakeholders. From Kabul,they flew to Khost province in a helicopter that was transporting labourers to construct a road for US forces deep inside the province. This was risky because they were right in the Taliban’s den. “The day we landed nearly 15 fidayeen bombers blew themselves up in Khost,” he says. Singh’s 22-minute documentary spoke about the life of the Afghan people and about how all development is seen as “consolidation of the US position in Afghanistan”.

Regional Languages (Print)

Prajeshsen G,Madhyamam Daily

A small story tucked away in a Malayalam daily—of a little boy suspected to be the victim of faulty clinical trials—caught Prajeshsen’s attention. Haunted by the story,he spent the next six months knocking doors of big pharmaceutical companies in major cities in the south of India to understand the why and how of clinical trials. “After my report,the High Court issued an order to stop clinical trials in Kerala. Later,the Supreme Court also banned all unethical clinical trials in the country while hearing a PIL about the same issue,” says Prajeshsen.

Regional Languages (Broadcast)

Kamlesh Bholanath Deorukhkar,IBN Lokmat

His 52-episode series,Garja Maharashtra,was a tribute to the institutions and people who drive the state’s economy. But it was his story on the beedi industry of Solapur that stood out for stories of lakhs of women who spend hours rolling beedis,often for a pittance and with no laws backing them. The story showed how the beedi industry in Solapur had affected the handloom industry,rendering the men largely jobless. “Due to this,the men had taken to drugs and the women were forced further into the beedi-rolling work with bare minimum wages,” says Deorukhkar.

Journalist of the Year (Print)

Josy Joseph,The Times of India

Joseph’s expose on the Adarsh housing society in Mumbai—where rules were bent to favour senior Army officers,bureaucrats and politicians for apartments in a prime Mumbai location—cost the chief minister his job. But Joseph calls it a case of “right timing”. “The story came out at a time when the youth were angry and restless and I guess that greatly contributed to the way it became such a big story,” says Joseph,who worked on this story for about six months,poring over endless documents. “I didn’t know it would have such an impact. By noon on the day the story was printed,the Defence Ministry ordered a probe,” he says. Joseph says the award proves that “there is still space for good journalism”.

Journalist of the Year (broadcast)

Ravish kumar,Ndtv India

Amidst the cacophony of voices that occupy prime time space on television,Kumar brings sensitivity and seriousness to the discussions on his shows. The anchor of Ravish ki Report,Prime Time,and Hum Log,Kumar says he spends four-five hours everyday researching for his shows. “One of the main challenges we face relates to the lack of resources in Hindi. A lot of time is spent on translation. Getting people for the talk show is difficult too,” he says. His shows begin with a trademark six-minute introduction on the day’s topic of discussion. “I do get a lot of criticism for the monologue in the shows but it is important to demystify information for the masses. The context of the issue has to be explained to the viewers.”

Lifetime Achievement Award

Inder Malhotra

Journalist,author,history’s witness,the rich swathe of Inder Malhotra’s career spans more than six decades. He started reporting in 1949 and has been present at all the big moments of independent India. During the campaign for the first general elections,he was there to observe that Nehru made the “same speech at six different places”. And when Nehru died,he was in Pakistan to record the tide of mourning for the Indian prime minister. Inder Malhotra has been chief political commentator and then resident editor for The Statesman,editor of The Times of India,New Delhi,and simultaneously,India correspondent for The Guardian. Since 1986,he has been a syndicated columnist for 30 newspapers and and journals. Since 2008,he has been a regular feature on The Indian Express’s Oped page,regaling readers with vignettes from a bygone era in his column,Rearview.

Uncovering India Invisible (Print)

Supriya Sharma,

The Times of India

For her in-depth coverage of the Maoist conflict in Chhattisgarh,Supriya had to trek long distances through impossible terrain,often vast jungles over several kilometres. “The greater challenge was to get past barriers—physical,cultural and linguistic—to get as close to the truth and do so without taking sides,” says Supriya. “The public debate over the Maoist conflict was quite polarised with plenty of ideological opinion but not enough factual information,” says Sharma. Her detailed coverage not only helped bring out more information about the conflict,but also gave an excellent perspective of the issue straight from the conflict zone.

Uncovering India Invisible (Broadcast)

Rupashree Nanda,CNN-IBN

Nanda’s The Big Grain Drain told a hard-hitting story of India’s callous management of procured food grain,a dysfunctional public distribution system and corruption that shadowed procurement,storage and distribution. “It told the story of how villages in Punjab,once the cradle of India’s green revolution,had become scenes of rotting food grain and neglected warehouses. Through RTI,we also found how the top brass of politicians were aware of the crisis and yet,had failed to respond; the symptom of a system that is neither efficient nor accountable,” said Nanda. Faced with shortage of storage spaces,India had even considered distress export of food grain.

Environmental Reporting (Print)

Shalini Singh,

The Hindustan Times

A features writer at HT,it was during a trip to Goa for a two-month environmental fellowship programme granted by the Centre for Science and Environment that Singh stumbled on an explosive story. “I had planned to write about unplanned tourism in the state,but instead ended up discovering illegal mining,” she says. From hiding inside trucks from where she saw the illegal minefields to accessing illegal documents that would implicate the mafia,what followed thereafter was an incredible narrative. “My story helped bring the issue of illegal mining in Goa to the spotlight,” she says.

Environmental Reporting (Broadcast)

Divya Srinivasan,NEWSX

As part of a weekly series called India Endangered,Srinivasan explored some of India’s threatened ecosystems—vanishing coastlines,pollution in the Yamuna and tigers on the verge of extinction. But what stood out was her story that explored the human-animal conflict that led to India’s elephant population dropping alarmingly. But it wasn’t an easy story to begin with. “The mining ministry refused to speak to us and we were chased away at various places,but eventually,the show got an overwhelming response and proved to be an eye-opener for many,” she says.

Reporting from J&K and the Northeast (Print)

Mehboob Jeelani,The Caravan

Jeelani first met Syed Ali Shah Geelani while covering the ‘separatist’ beat for a local newspaper in Srinagar. His was one personality that stayed with Jeelani as he moved to other beats and places. In 2010,at the height of the summer uprising in Srinagar,Jeelani wrote ‘The Man Who Says No To New Delhi’,a profile of the man whose stature as a leader had grown during those turbulent days. “I still think the most important conversation I’ve had with Geelani is about Sufism and not Kashmir,” says Jeelani. He says reporting from Kashmir has made him cynical “in a good way” as examining facts is the first lesson that you learn while reporting during a conflict.

Reporting from J&K and the Northeast (Broadcast)

Mufti Islah,CNN-IBN

In his 15 years of reporting from Jammu and Kashmir,Mufti says,the most difficult thing has been walking the 9 km from his home to office. “I have to cross 27 bunkers on the way which meant 27 chances of getting shot on my way to work,” he recalls. So in 2010,when the death of a youngster set off a cycle of deaths and funerals in Srinagar,Mufti understood this angst better than most others and decided to tell the story of the “faceless stone-pelter”. But the challenge was telling it on TV,without identifying the youth. Mufti’s 30-minute documentary Stone Rage told the story of these young men through their shadows and silhouettes. “The popular perception was that these people were uneducated and frustrated; the truth was quite the contrary,” he says.

BUSINESS AND ECONOMIC JOURNALISM (BROADCAST)

LATHA VENKATESH,CNBC-TV18

“I began by handling an esoteric part of the market: the money and bond markets. This is usually tucked away in a single line in most pink newspapers,but it has an important impact on our EMIs,our FD rates,and even on banks,” says Venkatesh. She has been covering this market since 1997,before home loans became ubiquitous. She consistently went beyond the jargon,simplifying finance and business for her audiences. “I discovered I had to understand a topic more thoroughly if I had to simplify it and I got greater attention for it. Simplicity appeared to be working.”

Film and Television Journalism (Print)

Suanshu Khurana,The Indian Express

Having heard stories about the reclusive surbahar player Annapurna Devi—Pandit Ravi Shankar’s first wife and daughter of Shankar’s guru Baba Alauddin Khan—Khurana went looking for her. “I was told that for half a century,many music writers had knocked on her door in vain,” she says. An exchange of handwritten letters later,the journalist found herself in a dilemma. “There were occasions when I wondered if putting all that information on her in the public domain would not uncover facets of her life that she did not want people to know,” says Khurana. After the story was published,Annapurna Devi wrote Khurana a thank-you note. “But with that,she told me that she never wanted to meet me. She did her duty of telling the world that she was fine,now it was my turn to leave her alone.”

Film and Television Journalism (Broadcast)

Geeta Datta,NEWSX

It all began with an half-hour special on remembering Hindi film composers Hemant Kumar,Madan Mohan and R D Burman. “The format and the episode were liked so much that we made it a weekly programme and called it Flashback,” says Datta. Flashback brought back to screen yesteryear greats—actors and music directors. “We got Shammi Kapoor,Jeetendra,R D Burman,Gulshan Bawra,Subhash Ghai,even Suniel Shetty to tell us their stories,share their journeys. We got them to talk about how memorable songs got made; Shammi Kapoor and R D Burman in Teesri Manzil,Subhash Ghai and Anand Bakshi in Ram Lakhan.”

SPORTS JOURNALISM (Print)

Shivani Naik,The Indian Express

The mountains serving as the backdrop for a Double Trap Event at the Asian Games held in China in 2010,Ronjan Sodhi beat two Chinese shooters—it is a memory that Naik still cherishes. “Events like these inspire you to write,” she says. Having extensively covered the 2010 Commonwealth and Asian Games,Naik says,“The Asian Games held in China were a revelation not only for the medals that India won,but also the smooth manner in which the Games were held,” she adds.

Reporting on Politics and Government (Print)

Vandita Mishra,

The Indian Express

For a pre-election series on the 2010 Bihar elections,Vandita Mishra crisscrossed the state to bring reports that captured from below the political change that was taking place. “2010 was a very exciting time to report from Bihar. The state was witnessing a sharpened conflict between a development-oriented politics and the politics of identity,and also a resetting of the terms of negotiation between the two. My effort was to find the stories of people and places that could give a sense of the large shifts that would eventually determine the electoral verdict,” says Mishra.

Reporting on Politics and Government (Broadcast)

Smita Sharma,IBN7

Sharma’s special feature,Ground Zero—Mission Kashmir,took a hard look at the reasons behind the sudden outpouring of angst in the Valley in the summer of 2010. “I wanted to take a look at the reasons for the anger among the youth,” she said. She travelled to Ganderbal and Bandipore,bastions of the ruling National Conference,to understand the challenges ahead for the peace and reconciliation process. “For New Delhi,it’s always about equating tourism and voter turnout with the peace process and I wanted to show how local elections are about local issues,” she said.

Prakash Kardaley Memorial Award for Civic Journalism

Metro Team,

The Hindustan Times

At a time when most of the national and international media were looking at the Commonwealth Games as Delhi’s ‘moment in the sun’,HT’s Metro Team went behind the façade to report stories that revealed the muck and chaos that Delhi had become in its wake. “From detailed stories on the plight of construction workers to the condition of the many hotels cropping up in the city and basic loopholes in the city’s civic infrastructure,we did exclusive stories that debunked the myth of the grandeur of the CWG,” says Shivani Singh,HT Metro Editor.

Commentary and Interpretative Writing

Vidya Subrahmaniam,

The Hindu

Subrahmaniam’s experience as a political reporter and her deep understanding of ground realities have enabled her to pen incisive opinion pieces that always go beyond the headlines. “The Hindu is known for its strong and widely read opinion pages and Vidya has had an important contribution in shaping these through her sharp and incisive political commentary. The best compliment was paid to Vidya some years ago in the pages of The Indian Express by psephologist Yogendra Yadav,who conceded her reading of election outcomes often was more accurate than most opinion pollsters,” says M K Venu,Executive

Editor,The Hindu.

Foreign Correspondent Covering India

Amy Kazmin,Financial Times

When Kazmin attempted to tell the tragic story of a young couple whose lives were destroyed by caste prejudices,it was the task of finding the voice of the girl that was the most challenging. Apart from a note that the girl had written to the boy,there was no other way of getting her side of the story. “I met the boy at least ten times and it was only later that he opened up to me. It was a story about how India is changing and how India is unchanging. The young generation does not care about caste. This girl wanted to be an RJ. Their first date was at a shopping mall,” says Kazmin.

Books (Non-Fiction)

Mahmood Farooqui

Going beyond the existing scholarship on the Revolt of 1857 which had focused largely on the causes behind the events and which section emerged as winners,Mahmood Farooqui’s book Besieged Voices From Delhi 1857 attempted to bring out voices of those who experienced the revolt. “1857 is a largely neglected phenomenon in Indian historiography. I was lucky to find a set of documents at the National Archives called the Mutiny Papers. The main challenge was translating the texts which were written in Shikasta Urdu—a shorthand style of Urdu writing which was used at that time,” says Farooqui.

On-the-spot Reporting (Print)

Manu Pubby,The Indian Express

In a series of stories following the February 2010 bombings that rocked Kabul,killing Indian officials working in Afghanistan,Pubby brought out the faces of those killed in the attacks and their lives in Kabul—from teaching English,yoga and vocational courses to treating children. He visited the Indian charity hospital in Kabul,documenting stories of the families who lost their kin. “Hundreds had turned up for the doctors who had been martyred in the attack. The kind words that local doctors and patients had for the slain doctors only matched their anger for the attackers,” says Pubby.

On-the-spot Reporting (Broadcast)

Hridayesh Joshi,NDTV INDIA

“When Operation Greenhunt began in 2009,I started following it keenly,” says Hridayesh Joshi. On April 6,2010,the Dantewada attack happened. “I was one of the first reporters to reach the spot. We showed not only the aftermath of the attack,but how it happened. We tried to show all sides of the battle—ill-trained CRPF and highly motivated Maoist cadre and the people caught in the cross-fire.” Joshi’s show followed the series of attacks over the next three months,in Bijapur and Narayanpur,capturing the low morale of the CRPF forces,the battlegrounds and the problems of tribals. A year later,when Joshi returned to these familiar territories,there was a perceptible change on the ground. “The morale had changed,the CRPF was better prepared to tackle Maoists.”

Business and Economic Journalism (Print)

Saumya Bhattacharya,

Business Today

Bhattacharya’s story on 20-somethings in the workplace brought to light the new phenomenon of how Indian companies,both old and new,were not only looking at this demographic as their new talent pool,but also going out of their way to woo them. “This was a time when we were still talking about economic meltdown and layoffs. This wasn’t a time for pampering employees. To prove that companies were doing it,and on an unprecedented scale,was the most challenging part,” says

Bhattacharya.

SPORTS JOURNALISM (BROADCAST)

Priyanka Dube,CNN-IBN

“We were covering the CWG Games when the games were mired in controversy and corruption. Stories that ran were of scams and scandals. But whenever we spoke to youngsters as part of live reporting,we saw their enthusiasm for sports,their pride in the athletes,” says Dube. India’s Golden Girls was then conceived as a documentary of women athletes with incredible stories and their achievements against all odds. “These stories needed to be told. We travelled back with them,to their homes,to tell their stories. These women had done a lot,sacrificed a lot to be where they were and these were interesting stories to tell. We had a great team too,who put together a show that paid a great tribute to India’s golden girls.”

SPORTS JOURNALISM (BROADCAST)

Smriti Adavni,CNN-IBN

Sharing the award with colleague and friend Priyanka Dube,Smriti Advani echoes Dube’s sentiments about the show. “We wanted to move the focus away from the scams and show the essence of the athletes. These girls were being credited,honoured but it was their spirit,humility,grit and determination that made the show. We wanted to explore their lives,how their families supported them,these girls who didn’t have it all,” says Advani.

Investigative Reporting (Print)

Chitleen Sethi,Tribune

It was a host of SMSes promising MBBS seats anywhere in the country that set Sethi on the lookout for touts. “At that time,I hadn’t realised that the network of these touts had percolated to the MD level at one of the most sought-after medical colleges in Punjab,” she says. Pretending to be the mother of an MBBS aspirant,Sethi spoke to the kingpin and met medical students who had got seats through the network of touts. “From my past experience,I knew that I would not wait for the government to set up an inquiry committee on the matter. I got as much corroborative evidence as possible,covered all bases to ensure that the guilty are punished immediately,” Sethi says.

Investigative Reporting (broadcast)

Harinder Baweja,

Headlines Today

“Once the judgment came,I started digging up,” Baweja says about her investigation into how,even 26 years after the Bhopal Gas disaster,victims were still waiting for justice. “Fortunately for me,I had reported on the tragedy when it happened so that gave me a solid background on the issue,” she says. When she went back to Bhopal after 26 years,there was a lot of public anger because the tragedy continues to “throw up new victims everyday”. Baweja exposed how senior officials in the government,“including the Indian ambassador in the US”,were writing to the PMO to waive off the fines imposed on the culprits.