SAJA Announces Winners of Journalism Awards and Scholarships at 15th Anniversary Gala

Kris Hundley of St. Pete Times and David Montero of Frontline/WORLD win the 2009 SAJA Daniel Pearl Award for Outstanding Reporting on South Asia.

July 16, 2009

NEW YORK (U.S. ASIAN WIRE) The South Asian Journalists Association (SAJA) and SAJA Group Inc. are pleased to announce the winners of the annual SAJA Journalism Awards. The winners and finalists, from media outlets big and small, were recognized at a gala dinner at Columbia University on Saturday, July 11. The awards were part of SAJA's 15th Anniversary Convention, which was headlined by religion scholar and author Dr. Reza Aslan and CUNY journalism professor and blogger Jeff Jarvis and attended by more than 500 journalists and guests from across the U.S. and Canada.



"The judges had an incredibly difficult time narrowing down the entries and selecting the winners," said Jigar Mehta, SAJA Awards Chair and a video producer at The New York Times. "The quality and range of the winners and finalists reflect the level of attention that media organizations are paying to South Asia and to the South Asian diaspora."



Among the prizes is the annual Daniel Pearl Award, named after the Wall Street Journal reporter kidnapped and killed in Pakistan in 2002. This year's winners are Kris Hundley of the St. Petersburg Times and David Montero of Frontline/WORLD . In addition to the categories that have been awarded for several years, SAJA instituted two one-time categories to reflect major events of the past year: the Mumbai terrorist attacks of November 2008 and the end of the decades-long civil war in Sri Lanka. This year, SAJA received more than 220 entries in 10 categories. Winners were selected by 40 judges who generously volunteered their time.



Mehta, SAJA's awards chair, will host a webcast with some of the winners on Tuesday, July 21 from 1-2 pm Eastern Time. They will discuss their work and share ideas and advice for producing excellent journalism. Tune in live or listen to the archive at http://bit.ly/sajawinnerswebcast



SAJA also awarded $11,500 in scholarships to five graduate students and two undergraduates who have demonstrated a strong interested in pursuing journalism. A list of those scholarship recipients is below.



2009 SAJA JOURNALISM AWARD WINNERS & FINALISTS:



Category 1 - The Daniel Pearl Award for outstanding reporting about South Asia, or South Asians in North America: All media
WINNERS: Testing Grounds: Our medicine at what cost -- Kris Hundley, St. Petersburg Times
Pakistan: State of Emergency -- David Montero,- FRONTLINE/World
FINALISTS: Karachi: The Urban Frontier -- Steven Inskeep, NPR
The Godfather of Bangalore -- Scott Carney, Wired



Category 2 - Outstanding business story about South Asia, or South Asians in North America: All media
WINNER: Indian to the Core, and an Oligarch -- Anand Giridharadas, The New York Times
FINALISTS:
India Billionaire Mallya IsnÕt Showing Shareholders Everything -- Abhay Singh and Subramaniam Sharma, Bloomberg
Grounded: Indian American Flight School Goes Out of Business -- Lisa Tsering, India West



Category 3 - Outstanding arts, culture, or travel story about South Asia, or South Asians in North America: All media
WINNER: A Nod to Arranged Marriage this Wedding Season -- Sandip Roy, NPR
FINALISTS:
Losing the Yeti -- Tim Sullivan, Associated Press



On the ÒSlumdogÓ Trail -- Jonathan Foreman, Standpoint
Category 4 - Outstanding editorial/commentary on South Asia, or South Asians in North America: All media
WINNER: The Real Bhutto: Against the Mythmaking -- Jonathan Foreman, National Review
FINALISTS:
First Person: CabbieÕs Girl -- Simran Chawla, The Washingtonian
Be Gay, Be Anything You Want - Just Not Single -- Sandip Roy, New America Media
How to Save Afghanistan-- Rory Stewart, Time



Category 5 - Outstanding photograph about South Asia, or South Asians in North America (single or series)
WINNER: Praying in Exile -- Emilio Morenatti, Associated Press
FINALIST: Domestic Violence in Pakistan -- Emilio Morenatti, Associated Press



Category 6 - Outstanding piece or series covering the Mumbai Attacks: All media
WINNER: India Security Faulted as Survivors Tell of Terror -- Yaroslav Trofimov, Geeta Anand, Peter Wonacott & Matthew Rosenberg, The Wall Street Journal
FINALISTS:
In Just Minutes, Mumbai Was Under Seige -- Emily Wax, The Washington Post
Mumbai Massacre: The Fourth Day -- Dan Harris (anchor), Nicholas Schifrin (correspondent), ABC News



Category 7 - Outstanding piece or series covering the conflict in Sri Lanka: All media
WINNER: Inside Sri Lanka -- Stewart Bell, The National Post
FINALISTS: Sri Lanka: A Terrorist in the Family -- Beate Arnestad, FRONTLINE/World
Sri Lanka Shadow War -- Ravi Nessman, Associated Press



Category 8 - For journalists of South Asian origin working in North America for any media outlet: Outstanding story on any subject: All media
WINNER: Chaplain TurnerÕs War (8-part narrative series) -- Moni Basu, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
FINALISTS:
Opting Out -- Geeta Anand, The Wall Street Journal
Education Push Yields Little for IndiaÕs Poor -- Somini Sengupta, The New York Times



Category 9 - For journalists of South Asian origin working in North America for any media outlet: Outstanding editorial/op-ed/commentary on any subject: All media
WINNER: Equal treatment for the uninsured? DonÕt count on it -- Manoj Jain, Washington Post
FINALISTS:
The Pitfalls of Linking DoctorsÕ Pay to Performance -- Sandeep Jauhar, The New York Times
Targeting Tolerance in Mumbai -- Sadia Shepard,The Forward



Category 10- Students of South Asian origin in North America: Outstanding story on any subject by a South Asian student in the US or Canada: All media
1st PLACE: : India: The Cost of Yellowcake. Mining Uranium on Tribal Lands -- Sonia Narang, Graduate School of Journalism, University of California - Berkeley
2nd PLACE: Healthy. Happy. Holy. -- Adithya Sambamurthy, Graduate School of Journalism, University of California - Berkeley
3rd PLACE: Hoardhouse: Compulsive Clutter in NYC -- Karn Dhingra, Jackie Kasuya, Ben Piven, Columbia Graduate School of Journalism




SAJA SCHOLARSHIP WINNERS


Graduate students:


1. Priyanka Pruthi -- $2,000 CNN-SAJA Scholarship for Broadcast Journalist


2. Siddhartha Vaidyanathan -- $1,500 SAJA Atlantic Media New Media Scholarship


3. Ramya Jegatheesan -- $2,000 SAJA Scholarship


4. Rehan Jamil -- $2,000 SAJA Scholarship


5. Hani Yousaf -- $1,000 SAJA Scholarship


Undergraduate College Students:


1. Carol Kuruvilla -- $1,500 SAJA Scholarship


2. Bibek Bhandari -- $1,500 SAJA Atlantic Media New Media Scholarship



Questions about the 2009 SAJA Awards should be directed to sajamember@gmail.com. More information about SAJA and its activities at http://www.saja.org and http://www.sajaforum.org You can follow SAJA on Twitter at http://twitter.com/sajahq