The government noted that his “work helps prevent the occurrence of violence in society likely to be caused by fake news.”
New Delhi:
Fact-checker and journalist Mohammed Zubair is the recipient of the 2024 Kottai Ameer Communal Harmony Award given by the Tamil Nadu government.
The citation notes that Zubair has been “rendering various services to promote communal harmony.”
It observes that in creating the website Alt News – which he co-founded with Pratik Sinha – Zubair has set up an instrument to analyse the “veracity of the news coming out on social media,” giving primacy to real news.
The government noted that his “work helps prevent the occurrence of violence in society likely to be caused by fake news.”
The citation especially says that in March 2023, when there was a rapid spread on social media of the disinformation that migrant workers were being attacked in Tamil Nadu, Alt News‘s verification of the authenticity of the video was instrumental in proving that the footage was not from Tamil Nadu at all.
It “stopped the spread of rumours against Tamil Nadu and acted to prevent violence caused by caste, religion, race and language in Tamil Nadu,” the government said.
In 2022, Zubair was arrested by the Delhi police for a 2018 tweet in which he shared a screenshot from a 1983 Hindi movie. Six cases were slapped on him during the period of his incarceration until the Supreme Court gave him bail.
Zubair is often attacked online by Hindutva commentators for fact-checking viral claims and disinformation.
source: http://www.thewire.in / The Wire / Home> Media> Government / by The Wire Staff / January 26th, 2024
Both journalists have won in the Government and Politics category. While Mishra’s piece has won in ‘digital’, Pasha’s is the ‘broadcast’ division winner.
Note: This article was originally published on December 29, 2021, when the awards were announced, and was republished on March 22, 2023, when Chief Justice of India (CJI) D.Y. Chandrachud handed them out.
New Delhi:
Journalists Dheeraj Mishra and Seemi Pasha have won the Ramnath Goenka Award in the Government and Politics category for reports which were published in TheWire, in the ‘digital media’ and ‘broadcast media’ divisions respectively.
Established in 2006, the Ramnath Goenka Excellence in Journalism Awards, is one of the most prestigious honours for journalists in India.
Dheeraj Mishra’s report focused on MPs’ unusually high expenses while travelling, for which he filed “30 to 35 RTIs in each ministry,” tackling enormous data.
It found that violating the guidelines prescribed for streamlining parliamentary committee study tours and cutting down expenses, members of the Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha have spent crores of taxpayers money on frequent outstation tours.
“The story had a noticeable impact as the Lok Sabha Secretariat issued instructions to sharply curtail [such] expenditure,” the IndianExpress noted in its announcement of the award.
Seemi Pasha’s video delved into Jamia Nagar, which in late 2019, developed into a neighbourhood attracting communal hatred from those opposed to the protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act. The otherness of the area was heightened with a brutal police crackdown on students of Jamia Millia Islamia in December 2019.
Even as stories of police brutality on students of Jamia Millia Islamia continue to unravel, the blame is being slowly being shifted to outsiders or locals residing in nearby areas of Batla House, Shaheen Bagh, Zakir Nagar – localities which are loosely referred to as Okhla or Jamia Nagar, the documentary found.
Titled Inside Jamia Nagar, the documentary sought answers for essential social questions. “This is a prominent Muslim ghetto in south Delhi and a place that is often viewed with suspicion. But why is that? What kind of people live here?” it asked.
source: http://www.thewire.in / The Wire / Home> Media / by The Wire Staff /edited by an additional picture via twitter / March 22nd, 2023
The Media Foundation has chosen Shahina KK as the winner of the Chameli Devi Award for an outstanding woman journalist. In her acceptance speech she spoke of her attempt to establish that the police conspired to forge a case against Abdul Madani after the Bangalore blasts. “I have always tried to espouse the cause of those who live on the margin and who cannot have their say,’’ she said.
She was awarded for work done while with Tehelka. She is now with Open magazine.
I am using this opportunity to explain who I am.
See, I happen to be a Muslim, but I am not a terrorist.
Unfortunately, anybody carrying a Muslim name, no matter whether he or she is a believer, agnostic or atheist has to keep this as an opening line on every occasion of a dialogue in public. I have hardly practiced any religion right from my adolescence yet I have to make this kind of a statement.
You may have an idea about what I am going to talk about. In fact this award gives me a great opportunity today to talk about the crime I have committed. I interviewed two of the prosecution witnesses in the infamous Bangalore blast case in which Kerala PDP leader Abdul Nasar Madani is an accused. Madani had spent 10 years in prison as an under-trail in the Coimbatore blast case of 1997 and later was exonerated in 2007. The firebrand orator, who once triggered some kind of belligerence among the post-Babri Masjid Kerala Muslim youth, in his second coming had made a public alliance with the left parties in the last Lok Sabha polls. A man who was speaking the language of democracy, a politician who was using the tools of parliamentary politics had been again taken by the police, this time from Karnataka, for his alleged involvement in the Bangalore blast case. He was arrested immediately after the Lok Sabha polls.
Two of the six prosecution witnesses in the case, Jose Thomas and Mohammed Jamal who is the younger brother of Madani, had approached the court alleging that their testimonies had been fabricated. The third witness was on death bed in a hospital in Ernakulam on the day the police recorded his testimony. He died four days later. Police records say that the testimony was recorded in Kannur, around 500 kms away from Ernakulam where he was admitted. The hospital records prove that on that day he was not in Kannur, but was very much in the hospital in Ernakulam. Speech continues here.
How did the politics of the Ram temple and the demolition of the Babri Masjid secure support for the militant Hindu nationalistic idea?
In this episode of ‘In Dino’, Mahtab Alam interviews senior journalist and author, Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay on the impact the Ram Janmabhoomi-Ayodhya movement had on India polity and society.
Mukhopadhyay in his latest book, The Demolition and the Verdict: Ayodhya and the Project to Reconfigure India (Speaking Tiger: 2021) analyses how politics of the Ram temple and demolition of Babri Masjid secured support for the militant Hindu nationalistic idea and the long-term implications of the imminent construction of the Ram Mandir.
source: http://www.thewire.in / The Wire / Home> Books / by Mahtab Alam / December 20th, 2021
Pa Gopalakrishna Memorial Award 2018 for ‘Best Rural Reporting’ was presented to Journalist Imtiaz Shah Tumbe at Patrika Bhavan.
His article on Kodagu natural calamity, published in Vartha Bharati, was selected for the award.
Shah, a sub-editor in Vartha Bharati, said he had stepped into the field of journalism without any proper background. He said his parent organisation had honed his skills and provided him with an opportunity. “I feel privileged to receive the award.”
Dakshina Kannada District Information and Public Relations Senior Assistant Director K Rohini presented the award to Shah.
Speaking on the occasion, Rohini said the family members of veteran journalist late Pa Gopalakrishna, who had instituted the award, had set an example for others.
DK District Working Journalists’ Association Srinivas Indaje presided over the programme. Secretary Ibrahim Adkasthala, Mangaluru Press Club President Annu Mangaluru, Patrika Bhavan Trust President K Ananda Shetty, Pa Go’s spouse Savitri and senior journalist Manohar Prasad were present.
source: http://www.megamedianews.com / MegaMedia News / Home / March 02nd, 2019
Senior Indian journalist P A Mubarak, 66, passed away on Friday night in hospital. He was undergoing treatment post Covid-19 complications for last two months.
He was the former Qatar correspondent for Chandrika daily in India. He worked with the Ministry of Commerce and was running his own business own company after leaving the ministry.
He was an active presence in Indian community activities over the years and has been general secretary of Kerala Muslim Cultural Centre (KMCC) and Pravasi, Indian expat organisations in Qatar.
He wife Najiya succumbed to Covid-19 in Qatar on April 30.
He is survived by two daughters Nadia Shameen and Fatima Mubarak and sons-in-law Muhammad Shameen (Etisalat, Dubai) and Parvez Vallikkad (Doha, Qatar Foundation).
The burial will be held this evening at Abu Hamour cemtary.
source: http://www.thepeninsulaqatar.com / The Peninsula / Home> Doha Today> Community / October 27th, 2021
Azra Mobin has been through a whirlwind of emotions in the past few weeks. The 35-year old social worker in Lucknow, while fasting during Ramadan, has arranged the cremation of around 7-8 COVID-19 patients who had no one to cremate them.
The first cremation that she arranged and witnessed was of an 80-year-old Moolchandra Srivastava, a man she did not know until his son Gaurav called and pleaded for help.
Moolchandra had been infected with COVID-19 and was admitted in a private hospital in the city. His son was apprehensive of cremating the body because he has diabetes, and his brother and sister-in-law were also infected with the virus.
From Aliganj, where she lives, she went to take the body and in ambulance went to Baikunth Dham to get him cremated. Accompanying her was Deepak, a friend of hers. Not just for help, but she had also asked Deepak to tag along for a better understanding of the last rites.
It was a hot sunny day and Mobin was fasting as well. Wearing the Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) suit, she started to feel dizzy. Mobin said, “I thought I would faint near the pyre where the body was burning, and I sat on a slab nearby. But I wanted to make sure the body was cremated first.”
Two crematorium workers, one of them named Khurshid, she recalled, also helped her during the cremation.
“Humein mazhab se matlab nahi hai, bas aisa nah ho ke kisi ki laash reh jaye,” said Mobin. (I don’t care about the religion; I just don’t want anyone’s body to be left behind.)
It all started last month when she felt helpless and numb hearing one devastating news after another. On 19 April, she posted her number on Facebook, asking people to contact her if any help needed for cremations.
The incident that still shakes her core
One day, after iftar, she had a conversation with a young 21 year old boy, Aman Srivastava that still breaks her heart.
Aman could not stop crying on the call. He was at Raebareli road and he had reached out for help for his mother but by then she had passed away. Aman has a younger sister. His father was in isolation and in a critical condition.
He was breathing heavily so Mobin asked him if he has COVID-19, to which he said, “No. I don’t. I just haven’t eaten anything. I miss my mother, how can I even eat?”
She tried to comfort him and assured that she is available if any help needed. The following day, she was back to arranging other cremations.
All this while, she could not stop worrying about the boy and wondered why he had not called. A few days later, his sister answered her call.
“The day after you called, my father passed away. The next day, my brother whom you spoke to, Aman also passed away. My grandmother, in this shock of these deaths, also passed away.” his sister said.
Already quite disturbed, Aman was told to take the ashes to Kanpur. He got in an accident and and passed away.
This hit Mobin really hard. She assured all help to the girl and her relatives, yet in that moment she felt nothing but helpless.
Throughout this second wave of the pandemic, one which has wreaked havoc in the urban and rural spaces, citizens keep trying to fill the gap created by the authorities. The onus to help with leads, provide materials and services have fallen on the shoulders of the locals. In an ideal world, citizens should not have had to do this.
‘No matter what your faith Is, I’m here to help’
Traditionally in India, Hindu or Muslim women do not participate in last rites, visit the cremation grounds or cremate the bodies.
For some families, generally, she said, they are scared to cremate or go to the cremation grounds. Either the family members are not available or they are self-isolating. A lot of times neighbours have also refused to help.
After the first cremation, Mobin received a lot of messages of encouragement from people. From a Muslim cleric to strangers, they all sent their prayers and that emboldened her to continue working.
“I thought about the people that have been cremated — did they even know me? Did they ever think their family will not be cremating them?” I think, maybe, God made me connected to them for a reason,” she said.
Mobin is a mother of two, an 11-year-old girl and a 9-year-old boy. When she decided to help during the pandemic, she sent them to their grandmother’s house. Mobin’s mother was worried and disapproved of the work initially, but Mobin is not one to back down. “I tell my mother I have gotten this altruistic spirit from her that she cannot do much about,” she said.
When she returns from the cremation ground, she discards the PPE suit and self-isolates.
Uttar Pradesh on Thursday reported 17,745 new coronavirus cases, 277 deaths in 24 hours. Out of the deaths, more than 20 were from Lucknow. The government, however, has been accused of reportedly concealing the numbers.
On being asked if she fears any action from the government, Mobin said, “I am not scared of talking about the reality on the ground. If they think by highlighting the reality, people are spreading ‘rumours,’ then they can come with me on the ground, see and hear the cries of the people. I have seen people losing their lives on the road.”
As she continues to attend to SOS calls, she also thinks of her future. “What if tomorrow when I die, I have no one to cremate my body? I would like to think that someone will be there for me when my time comes,” she remarked. The only positive note here, she says is that the calls for cremation have reduced in the past couple of days.
Aliza Noor is a multimedia journalist based in Lucknow.
source: http://www.maktoobmedia.com / Maktoob / Home> Features India> North India / by Aliza Noor / May 14th, 2021