3 Indian photojournalists win Pulitzer prize for Kashmir coverage, see pictures

Team Udayavani, May 5, 2020, 8:42 AM IST

Photo credit: Associated Press

Three Indian photojournalists from Jammu and Kashmir working with the Associated Press news agency (AP) have been awarded the 2020 Pulitzer Prize in the feature photography category.

India’s unprecedented crackdown on Indian-administered Kashmir in August last year, which included a sweeping curfew and shutdowns of phone and internet services, was difficult to show to the world.

However, AP’s photographers Dar Yasin, Mukhtar Khan, and Channi Anand found ways to report it and they have been honored with the 2020 Pulitzer Prize in the feature photography category.

Here are their award-winning pictures:

Picture-1 clicked by Dar Yasin features a masked Kashmiri protester jumps on the bonnet of an armored vehicle of Indian police as he throws stones at it during a protest in Srinagar. (Photo Credit: Associated Press)

Picture-2 clicked by Mukhtar Khan features a Six-year-old Muneefa Nazir, a Kashmiri girl whose right eye was hit by a marble ball allegedly shot by Indian soldiers on August 12, 2019. (Photo Credit: Associated Press)

Picture-3 clicked by Channi Anand features an Indian Border Security Force (BSF) soldier keeps vigil near the India-Pakistan border, about 35km (22 miles) west of Jammu. (Photo Credit: Associated Press)

Pulitzer board administrator Dana Canedy declared the winners from her living room via a Livestream on YouTube rather than at a ceremony at New York’s Columbia University.

In a statement on their website following the announcement, Pulitzer said the Kashmiri photographers were selected for their “striking images of life” in the disputed Himalayan territory.

The Pulitzers are generally regarded as the highest honor that United States-based journalists and organizations can receive.