Scroll.in’s Menaka Rao, Shone Satheesh, Smitha Nair and Sruthisagar Yamunan won RedInk awards for Excellence in Journalism on Friday. The award ceremony was held at Jamshed Bhaba Theatre in Mumbai’s NCPA complex.
Rao won the award in the health and wellness category for her series on a malaria outbreak in Andhra Pradesh. She tracked the families of 16 people who had died of malaria in a remote Andhra village and reported how the state health department had flouted national guidelines on detecting malaria cases by using chloroquine. This had led to drug-resistant strains of the disease developing and under-reporting of malaria cases.
Satheesh won the award in the human rights category for a video that revealed how relocated slum residents in Mumbai were choking on lethal toxins. The video told the story of families whose members had either fallen sick or had died after moving to the heavily polluted Mahul neighbourhood.
Nair won the award in the sports and television category for her interview of badminton legend Prakash Padukone. Her piece traced how Padukone’s All England win in 1980 became the catalyst for the rise of Indian badminton.
Yamunan, who tracked how the Centre’s cattle trade rules affected small farmers in drought-hit Tamil Nadu, won the award in the business and economy category.
Senior journalist Mark Tully won the Lifetime Achievement in Journalism award. He was BBC’s bureau chief in Delhi before resigning in July 1994. Faye D’Souza, the executive editor of the news television channel Mirror Now, was declared Journalist of the Year.
Fifteen RedInk awards were handed out this year – 13 in competitive categories and two in special categories.
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