Kolkata, Nov 26 (IBNS): NGO Population First in collaboration with United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) announced the winners of the Laadli Media Awards for Gender Sensitivity (Eastern Region) 2011-12
at G.D. Birla Sabhagar in Kolkata.
The winners were selected by a highly esteemed jury comprising—Nabaneeta Dev Sen, Shoma A Chatterji, Ratnottama Sengupta, Rajashri Dasgupta, Paula Banerjee, Buroshiva Dasgupta, Amitava Bhattacharya, Ananya Chatterjee Chakraborti from West Benagal; Sampad Mahapatra, Rajaram Satpathy from Odisha and Jimoni Choudhury, Manju Borah and Rita Chowdhury from the North East.
They selected the winners from around 213 entries received from across Eastern India, comprising of Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Bihar, Jharkhand, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Odisha, Sikkim, Tripura and West Bengal.
The awards were given away at an aesthetically designed ceremony which witnessed performances by members of Kolkata Sanved, Usha Uthup and Suranjana Dasgupta, and was attended by senior government officials, media and NGO representatives and celebrities.
The Chief Guest on this occasion was Chairperson, West Bengal Commission for Women Sunanda Mukherjee.
Also present were Executive Trustee, Population First S V Sista and eminent communication expert and theater person Dolly Thakore.
The Laadli Media Awards for Gender Sensitivity highlights, acknowledges and celebrates the commendable efforts by various media at providing gender-just perspectives, portrayals and analysis.
Eminent dancer Debjani Chaliha, renowned theater person Usha Ganguli and well-known artist Eleena Banik gave away the Awards.
The Awards aim to provide the media with a ‘gender lens’ for gender-sensitive reporting or advertising and promote gender sensitivity as an important professional value among the media persons.
Launched in March 2007 in Mumbai, the focus of the awards was on mainstreaming gender into media as media has tremendous impact on moulding the mindsets of people.
Programme Director of Population First A L Sharada, said, "To make the campaign against sex selection a people’s movement, it is important that effective use is made of the power of mass media to influence the mindsets and behaviours of people that promote gender discrimination."
"This involves engaging the media in introspecting about its own social commitments, eliciting communication support from the media for the movement and using new developments in the media – e-communities, SMS campaigns, and multi-media options – to create widespread youth participation in the initiatives to protect and promote the girl child."
