Vartika Nanda
Amidst the hullabaloo of the Anna Hazare campaign, Indian media played a crucial role in initiating the nation to move towards the Jan Lokpal Bill. The Indian media emerged as a crusader of change and helped a lonesome old man to run the campaign successfully. In the light of this, e4m News Broadcasting Awards 2011 brought a deep sense of satisfaction amongst the media professionals.
Dr Karan Singh, Senior Congress leader and an accomplished writer himself, was the Chief Guest at the Awards ceremony. Aroon Purie, Founding Chairman and Editor-in-Chief, India Today Group, was conferred the Lifetime Achievement Award. Puri is also the Managing Director of Thomson Press (India) Limited and the Chairman and Managing Director of TV Today. He is also the Editor-in-Chief of Reader’s Digest India.
Delivering the opening address, Annurag Batra, Chairman and Editor-in-Chief, exchange4media Group emphasized that the objective of e4m News Broadcasting Awards is to encourage broadcasters on their news coverage. News media has been accused of senstaionalisation of news for more than a decade now but the fact remains that they have helped immensely in nation building too.
Jury Chairman and the Editor-in-Chief of The Indian Express, Shekhar Gupta referred to the electronic media a “great potential force” more so in the light of many references that were made at the Parliamentary debate concerning the role of the news media in the Jan Lokpal Bill movement. Gupta was awarded the Padma Bhushan for the year 2009 for his contribution to the field of journalism.
More than 25 awards were given to media professionals handling different responsibilities ranging from anchoring to production and reporting.
The programme was well attended by the well known personalities of the Indian media.