Tusha Mittal of Tehelka's Kolkata News Bureau has been chosen for the Chameli Devi Jain Award, 2012. Ms. Mittal has been chosen as the Outstanding Woman Mediaperson for her “sterling reportage of life in the raw at the margins in deep interior Bengal, Orissa and Chhattisgarh, in areas affected by bloody civil strife, Naxal and vigilante violence and dangerous living along the Bangladesh border, where cattle smuggling is rife.”
The jury that chose her comprised Shravan Garg, group editor, Bhaskar; Seema Mustafa, columnist and director of Centre for Policy Analysis; and Pamela Philipose, director of the Women's Feature Service. The award, instituted by the Media Foundation, will be presented on March 13 in New Delhi. This will be followed by a release of a book of essays by previous Chameli laureates, titled “Making News, Breaking News, Her Way” published by Tranquebar and a panel discussion on “What Has Changed for or Because of Women in the Media.”
Tusha Mittal has been with Tehelka since March 2008. She was educated at La Martiniere, Kolkata, and has a bachelor's degree from Depauw University in Indiana. While in the US, she worked as a reporter and a special sections editor for a local newspaper in Boston. She also interned with CNN Internationalin Atlanta and NBC Universal in London. In her final year in college, she studied the idea of peace journalism and the role of the media in covering conflict. She travelled to Kashmir for her graduation thesis, which dissected the role of the Indian and Pakistani media in shaping public perception of the Kashmir conflict. Her journalism interests include reporting on environment, human rights, and conflict. She has recently won The Press Institute of India award for best articles on humanitarian issues published in the Indian media. At Tehelka, she has written extensively on land rights and displacement struggles. She is based in New Delhi.
The jury that chose her comprised Shravan Garg, group editor, Bhaskar; Seema Mustafa, columnist and director of Centre for Policy Analysis; and Pamela Philipose, director of the Women's Feature Service. The award, instituted by the Media Foundation, will be presented on March 13 in New Delhi. This will be followed by a release of a book of essays by previous Chameli laureates, titled “Making News, Breaking News, Her Way” published by Tranquebar and a panel discussion on “What Has Changed for or Because of Women in the Media.”Tusha Mittal has been with Tehelka since March 2008. She was educated at La Martiniere, Kolkata, and has a bachelor's degree from Depauw University in Indiana. While in the US, she worked as a reporter and a special sections editor for a local newspaper in Boston. She also interned with CNN Internationalin Atlanta and NBC Universal in London. In her final year in college, she studied the idea of peace journalism and the role of the media in covering conflict. She travelled to Kashmir for her graduation thesis, which dissected the role of the Indian and Pakistani media in shaping public perception of the Kashmir conflict. Her journalism interests include reporting on environment, human rights, and conflict. She has recently won The Press Institute of India award for best articles on humanitarian issues published in the Indian media. At Tehelka, she has written extensively on land rights and displacement struggles. She is based in New Delhi.
