Tag Archives: Indian Muslim Journalist

Tamil Nadu Govt Honours Fact-Checker Mohammed Zubair With Communal Harmony Award

Bengaluru, KARNATAKA:

TN chief minister M.K. Stalin with Mohammed Zubair at the awarding ceremony. Photo: Video screengrab.

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

Dheeraj Mishra, Seemi Pasha Win Ramnath Goenka Awards for 2019 Reports for ‘The Wire’

NEW DELHI:

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.

Dheeraj Mishra (left) and Seemi Pasha.

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 The Wire, 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 Indian Express noted in its announcement of the award.

twitter.com/seemi_pasha

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

Shahina KK wins Chameli Devi Award

KERALA:

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.

From The Hoot

source: http://www.nwmindia.org / NWMI – network of women in media, india / Home> Award Winners / January 29th, 2014

Watch | ‘Narendra Modi Is the Product of the Ayodhya Agitation

NEW DELHI :

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 Go award 2018 presented to Journalist Imtiaz Shah Tumbe

Mangaluru, KARNATAKA :

Imtiyaz

Mangaluru :

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

Qatar-based Indian journalist P A Mubarak passes away

KERALA / Doha, QATAR :

Doha:

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