Nobel chemistry winners are announced early in rare slip-up
Stockholm (AP): The most prestigious and secretive prize in science ran headfirst into the digital era Wednesday when Swedish media got an emailed press release revealing the winners of the Nobel Prize in chemistry and the news prematurely went public.
The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences said it was investigating.
About four hours before the official announcement was planned Wednesday, several Swedish media received a press release from the academy revealing that U.S.-based scientists Moungi Bawendi, Louis Brus and Alexei Ekimov had won the 2023 chemistry prize for their work on quantum dots.
The Associated Press did not receive the press release in advance and decided not to publish the names until confirmed by the academy, but many Swedish media organizations did. Many were suspicious of the email at first. They published the information, however, since the academy didn't write it off as false, merely insisting that the final decision on a winner had not yet been taken.
"We don't know what happened," the academy's secretary-general, Hans Ellengren, told The Associated Press. "This is very unfortunate, and we regret very much that that this happened. Exactly what happened I can't tell, because we don't know ourselves."
The five-member Nobel Prize committees spend months whittling down lists of nominations before the full academy makes its official decision on the day of the award, announcing Nobel winners at a scheduled news conference.
Wednesday's premature press release reinforced suspicions that the final decision is just a formality, since material including background information on the winners must be prepared in advance.
More importantly, it showed the difficulty of keeping anything secret for long in the age when virtually everything is online.
"It is an important principle that the prize winners are the first to find out, and that everyone else finds out afterward at the same time," the former head of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, G ran Hansson, told news agency TT. "But in the electronic era the leaks can occur in different ways than in the newspaper era."
Until just under a decade ago, the academy sent a courier to AP and other news agencies carrying an envelope with the names of the winners. The courier would be connected to the academy by phone and wait for a cue to hand over the envelope at the moment the prize committee started reading the names of the winners.
The academy stopped the practice since the awards were being announced simultaneously on the digital platforms of the Nobel Prizes.
It is not the first time the names of winners slip out before the Nobel announcements. The literature prize, in a particular, was plagued by leaks in recent decades. And in 2010, Swedish newspaper Svenska Dagbladet published the name of the medicine winner in advance.
TV4, public broadcaster SVT and news agency TT were among the Swedish media who received the news release by email at 7:31 a.m., just over four hours ahead of the scheduled prize announcement at 11:45 a.m.
Ellengren, the academy's secretary-general, said it would not comment on the exact process of nominating and awarding Nobel Prize laureates.
"The actual decision is not made until the academy meets the very same day as we announce the prize," he said.
For the official press release to be published in advance is extremely rare, said Fredrick Malmberg, head of news at Swedish television station TV4.
"I have worked since 1995 at TV4 and I cannot remember anything like this before," he said. "It is incredible."
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Bengal: Over 55 pc turnout till 1 pm in repoll in 15 booths of 2 assembly seats
Kolkata (PTI): Over 55 per cent turnout was recorded till 1 pm in repoll in 15 booths of two assembly constituencies in West Bengal's South 24 Parganas district on Saturday, an official said.
Voting was underway more or less peacefully at 11 polling stations of Magrahat Paschim assembly constituency and four in Diamond Harbour, where the EC ordered repoll a day ago, following reports of electoral malpractices.
However, at booth number 179 at Chanda Primary School of Diamond Harbour seat, the Trinamool Congress alleged that a specially abled voter and his mother were harassed by central forces. The alleged incident sparked protests by party workers and locals.
The TMC claimed that the voter's mother, who had entered the booth to assist him, and her son were detained for a considerable time by central forces over alleged rule violations.
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"TMC leaders Manmohini Biswas and Pratik Ur Rahman reached the spot and led the protests, with residents terming the action unwarranted harassment. The matter has been taken care of by our officials there," an official of the poll body said.
Polling was otherwise peaceful across 15 booths in the area, he added.
Voting began at 7 am and will continue till 6 pm, the official said, adding that till 1 pm, the turnout was 55.57 per cent.
Magrahat Paschim registered 56.33 per cent voter turnout, while in Diamond Harbour, it was 54.9 per cent, a poll official stated.
Voting in these two assembly constituencies was held in the second phase of the state elections on April 29.
The repoll order was based on reports received from returning officers and observers of the two constituencies and "material circumstances", the Election Commission official said.
In Magrahat Paschim, TMC's Md Samim Ahamed Molla is pitted against BJP nominee Goursundar Ghosh, while Abdul Majid Halder of the Congress and ISF candidate Abdul Aziz Al Hassan are also in the fray.
TMC candidate Panna Lal Halder is contesting against Dipak Kumar Halder of the BJP in the Diamond Harbour seat. Goutam Bhattacharya of the Congress and CPI(M)'s Samar Naiya are among other candidates.
The BJP had alleged rampant electoral malpractices in certain polling stations of both the assembly seats under the Diamond Harbour Lok Sabha constituency, which is represented by TMC national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee.
The EC had deputed its special observer, Subrata Gupta, to fact-check the allegations from the ground.
The poll panel will decide on repolling in the Falta assembly constituency on Saturday.
The West Bengal assembly elections were held in two phases -- April 23 and April 29 -- amid unprecedented security arrangements.
Counting of votes will take place on May 4.
