The Caravan magazine on Tuesday won the Louis M Lyons Award for Conscience and Integrity in Journalism for its “unique and uncompromising coverage of the erosion of human rights, social justice, and democracy in India”. The magazine is the first news organisation from India to win the award set up by the Nieman Fellows at Harvard University.

The selection of the publication for the award also came under “extraordinary and alarming circumstances”, a statement from the Nieman Foundation said.

“The Caravan’s recent coverage of nationwide farmers’ protests has drawn the ire of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government, which has attempted to shut down the magazine’s social media accounts and brought sedition charges against multiple Caravan employees,” the foundation said. “Under such intimidation, The Caravan embodies an urgent commitment to conscience and integrity.”

The Neiman Foundation said The Caravan has persistently spoken truth to power while documenting the rise of political Hinduism India over the past decade. The magazine’s work, the statement said, “is another chapter in a legacy of indispensable reporting in the world’s most populous democracy”.

“Risking violence and imprisonment, its reporters have written an essential series of investigations into Hindu supremacist terrorism, political murder, caste and gender injustice, and ethnic violence against India’s Muslim minority,” it added. “The Caravan has repeatedly demonstrated that it represents a beacon of moral clarity in Indian public life.”