The PoleStar Foundation announces the winners of 20th Annual PoleStar Awards Celebration of excellence in Journalism and Social Impact

Chennai: NP NEWS 24 ONLINE – The PoleStar Foundation, an independent Trust established in 1998 to recognize Excellence in Journalism & Social Impact in India, conducted the 20^th Annual PoleStar Awards on the evening of 23^rd November 2018 at Hyatt Regency Chennai. The awards function started with the special performance by Anil Srinivasan, one of India’s most innovative and path-breaking Pianist. Prof MS Swaminathan, Founder & Chairman of MS Swaminathan Research Foundation (MSSRF), congratulated the winners and the foundation via Audio Visual message for the 20th PoleStar Awards.

The Polestar Awards honour exemplary work in the fields of Journalism and Social Impact. In Journalism, the categories include Best Feature in Technology Journalism, Best Feature in Business Journalism, Best Good News Feature. And the Social Impact Awards in four categories: Education, Livelihood, Health and Empowerment and the Jury’s Special Recognition. The Technology & Business journalism awards consist of a trophy, a citation and a cash prize of Rs. 2 Lakh. The Jury’s Special Mention, Best Good News Feature and all four Social Impact awards include a trophy, a citation and a cash prize of Rs. 1 Lakh.

The Winners of the 20^th Annual PoleStar Awards are:         

1. Best Feature Technology Journalism – Mr. Shyamanuja Das for his article, ‘Decoding Digital Transformation In India’, which appeared in CIO & Leader.

2. Best Feature Business Journalism – Mr. Pratap Vikram Singh, for his feature ‘A tangled wireless tale’, which appeared in ‘Governance Now’

3. Best Good News Feature – Ms. Adrija Bose for her article, ‘In This Haryana Village, There Is A Woman Footballer In Nearly Every Home’, which appeared in HuffPost India.

4. Best Social Impact – Education – Katha, New Delhi

5. Best Social Impact – Livelihood – Kamalnayan Jamnalal Bajaj Foundation, Wardha, Maharashtra

6. Best Social Impact – Health – Sankara Eye Foundation, Coimbatore

7. Best Social Impact – Empowerment – SGBS Unnati Foundation, Bangalore

8. Jury’s Special Recognition for the Health Category – Centre for Action Research and People’s Development  (CARPED), Hyderabad 

Arun Jain – Founder, PoleStar Foundation and Chairman, Intellect Design Arena Limited, delivered the Keynote address on the ‘Beauty of human mind’. He said, “Beauty emanates from Contribution, Compassion, celebration, connection and Imagination. Beauty doesn’t come from imitation but from one’s own thoughts and action. Beauty does not come from controlling. Beauty is embedded in courage, compassion, creativity and commitment and their thinking. And that is the beauty, we celebrate at Polestar Foundation.”

This year, the Foundation received over 473 nominations (Journalism – 343 ; Social Impact – 130) from journalists and social impact enablers across India. The entries were evaluated by a panel of jurors comprising of esteemed jury members from the corporate world and academia selected the winners in all categories of Journalism and Social Impact. The jury panel included,

Mr. Abhay Gupte, CEO – Manipal Technology Limited, Ms. Aruna Rao, Executive VP & CTO –Kotak Mahindra Bank, Dr. Ashok Korwar – Growth Consultant and CEO Coach, Dr. Chandrashekar Pran, Founder of Teesari Sarkar Abhiyan, Mr. David Appasamy. Head – Brand & Strategy, Social Beat, Ms. Meenakshi Ramesh, Co-founder at Citizen Matters, Mr. Mukesh Sharma, Co-Founder & Managing Director – Menterra, Dr. Narayan Hegde – Trustee and Former President, BAIF, Mr. Sriram Sivaram – President, Madras Engineering Industries, Mr. V. Giriraj, IAS, Former Additional Chief Secretary – Finance Department (Retd), Ms. Vijayalakshmi Rao – Business Advisor and Mentor.

The awards ceremony witnessed eminent media personalities, leaders from the Industry and students from Journalism and Social Work schools in Chennai.