Karnataka Media Academy announces awards for 2023, 2024
Vartha Bharati's Editor-in-Chief gets Lifetime Achievement Award
Bengaluru: The Karnataka Media Academy announced its Lifetime Achievement Awards, Annual Awards, and Endowment Awards for 2023 and 2024 on Thursday.
The prestigious Lifetime Achievement Award for 2023 was announced for veteran journalist A.C. Shivanna. For 2024, Abdussalam Puthige, Editor-in-Chief of Vartha Bharati, was selected for this honor for his significant contributions to journalism.
Among the Annual Award recipients for 2023 was Ibrahim Adkasthala from Vartha Bharati, recognized for his outstanding work. Muhammad Akheel, also from Vartha Bharati, received an Endowment Award for his impactful reporting.
Several other journalists were acknowledged for their exceptional contributions over the two years. Notable recipients of the 2023 Annual Awards included Gangadhar Modliyar, Prof. Usha Rani N., Sushilendra Nayak, Vasudeva Holla, Alfred Tennison, and others who excelled in various fields of journalism.
For 2024, recipients of the Annual Awards included Prof. A.S. Balasubrahmanya, Rishikesh Bahadur Desai, Subhash Huggar, and several other notable journalists whose work brought significant attention to pressing issues in society.
The Endowment Awards highlighted excellence in specific categories. The Kannadamma Patrike Award was given to Ravi Kumar Channabasappa Kagganavar for his report on KYC updates and Vijay Kotiyaan from Vijay Karnataka for his feature on intellectuals. The
Mysuru Diganta Award recognized Shivananda Gombi of Kannada Prabha for his report on villagers emptying lake water and Sandhya Hegde of Prajavani for her feature on a beedi worker’s dream cut short.
Other significant awards included the Praja Sandesha Award for Shilpa P. of Deccan Herald for her report on manual scavenging, the Dr. B.R. Ambedkar Mookanayaka Award to K. Neela from Kalaburagi, and the C.V. Rajagopal Memorial Award to K.M. Ravishankar from Kannada Prabha.
Special mentions for 2024 included Muhammad Akheel from Vartha Bharati for his report on untouchability in Koppal, B.K. Devayya from Republic Kannada News for his report on delayed pensions, and Nandeesh Mallenahalli from Suvarna News for a series on land allocation for the specially-abled.
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Ex-PM Devegowda warns opposition of electoral losses if they continue to allege 'vote chori'
New Delhi (PTI): Former Prime Minister H D Devegowda on Monday said the Opposition parties would "suffer" if they continue to raise allegations of "vote chori" and create suspicion in the minds of voters by blaming Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led government.
Participating in a discussion on election reforms in the Rajya Sabha, he criticised the Opposition for making a mockery about the Prime Minister "in the streets and on the public platform".
"This (India) is a very big country. A large country. Congress may be in three states. Remember my friends please, by using the words 'vote chori' you are going to suffer in the coming days. You are not going to win the battle," Devegowda said, referring to the Opposition members.
He asked what the Opposition is going to earn by "blaming Narendra Modi's leadership and creating a suspicion in the mind of the voters" through the claims of "vote chori".
"What has happened to their minds? Let them rectify," Devegowda said.
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The former prime minister said that during his over seven decades of public life, he has never raised such issues of vote theft despite facing defeat in elections.
He also cited a letter written by the then Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru regarding inclusion of "18,000 votes" (voters) in Kerala.
"Why I am telling this (because) during the Nehru period also, there were certain lapses in the electoral system," said Devegowda, who was the prime minister between June 1, 1996 and April 21, 1997.
He said that the Congress party faced defeat in the recent Bihar elections despite raising the issues of mistakes in the electoral rolls.
"What happened after that even after so much review (of voters list). Think (for) yourself! You got six MLAs," the senior Janata Dal (Secular) leader said.
Devegowda questioned the Opposition as to why they want to make allegations against the prime minister on the issue of the voters list?
"Election Commission is there. Supreme Court is there. The Election Commission has given direction to all the state units to rectify all these things," he said.
Devegowda said people of the country have full confidence in Narendra Modi's government and it will come back to power after the next Lok Sabha elections as well.
K R Suresh Reddy, Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) party's Rajya Sabha member from Telangana, said that electoral reforms are the backbone for a healthy democracy.
He said a large and diverse nation like Indi needs clean electoral rolls.
Asserting that strict re-verification should not become a mechanism for exclusion, Reddy said no eligible voter should lose their right to vote simply because accessing paperwork is difficult.
He said while the concern definitely is on the voters' exclusion, "we should also be equally concerned about the percentage of voting."
"What is happening in voting today? Once the election ends, the drama begins. The biggest challenge that the Indian democracy has been facing in spite of two major Constitutional amendments has been the anti-defection. Anti-defection is the name of the game today, especially in smaller states, especially where the legislatures are small in number," Reddy said.
The senior BRS leader suggested creation of a parliamentary committee "which would constantly look into the defection" and "ways and means to cutting that".
AIADMK's M Thambidurai raised the issues related to election campaigning.
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"Election campaigns are one of the important election processes. In that, political parties must be given the proper chance to campaign," he said and cited problems faced by his party in Tamil Nadu in this regard.
Thambidurai said political parties were facing hardships in Tamil Nadu to conduct public meetings and to express their views to the public.
YSRCP's Yerram Venkata Subba Reddy stressed on bringing electoral reforms at both the state and national levels.
He also suggested replacing Electronic Voting Machines with paper ballots in all future elections.
"EVM may be efficient but can't be trusted. Paper ballot may not be efficient but can be trusted. You need trust in democracy," Reddy added.
