Zubair Qureshi
Two working journalists Sidra Dar and Aiman Mahmood were honoured by the Embassy of France for their extensive research-based work and successful completion of the Trust Fellowship Programme 2021–22.
The “Kalam” Centre of Trusting Societies hosted the Trust Fellowship Programme, a platform for journalists focusing on trust as one of the fundamental building blocks of human agency and wellbeing.
In 2019, the AGAHI team introduced the concept of “Kalam” at the Global Foresight Summit in 2020.
On Friday, AGAHI with the support from the Embassy of France celebrated the work of the two journalists and acknowledged their efforts in bringing out the plight of the less-privileged communities.
Ambassador of France Nicolas Galey presented the Trust Fellows gold medals and said that their work “showed a promising future for the quality of journalism and media freedom in the country which France is happy to support and celebrate.”
On March 24, Sidra Dar and Aiman Mahmood had presented research work during an online discussion. The focus of Aiman Mahmood’s research was the fishermen community of Ibrahim Hayderi documenting the narrative through a democracy lens whereas Dar’s was on the identity challenges of the Bengali community oriented more towards human rights.
The Fellows discussed with the French ambassador their research work produced as a result of the Trust Fellowship Programme.
Both of them are also the recipients of the AGAHI Awards 2021 in the categories of Human Rights (HR) and Democracy.
In a three-month fellowship programme aimed to encourage information hygiene by improving the state of factual reporting practices in the country with the mission to cultivate trust in the society, the Fellows were provided with extensive training course and mentorship sessions to improve their understanding of the factors that drive trust in journalism, including an advance understanding on misinformation, disinformation and misinformation practices.
