The Hindu : Sport : Nirmal Shekar bags four awards

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Tuesday, Jun 10, 2008
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Sport

Sport

Nirmal Shekar bags four awards

Special Correspondent

PROUD MOMENT: Nirmal Shekar, Sports Editor, The Hindu, receiving one of his four awards from Dilip Vengsarkar at the SJFI awards function in Mumbai on Sunday night.

Mumbai: Nirmal Shekar, Sports Editor of The Hindu, was adjudged the Indian Sports Writer of the Year 2007 at the third Sports Journalists Federation of India (SJFI)’s Indian Sports Journalism Awards for Excellence in Reporting, Writing, Photography and Broadcasting, here on Sunday.

The Indian Sports Writer award was one of four that Shekar won on a night when he also walked away with the Sports Columnist of the Year, Feature Writer of the Year and News Story Writer of the Year awards.

Pullela Gopichand, the former all-England champion and current National badminton coach, and Dilip Vengsarkar, Chairman of the senior National Selection Committee of the Board of Control for Cricket in India, presented trophies and certificates to the winners at The Grand Joss here.

Vipin Pawar of DNA won the Indian Photographer of the Year 2007 award.

The judges for the reporting and writing awards were cue sports legend Geet Sethi and former India cricketer Madhav Apte.

Arko Datta of Reuters and former India hockey goalkeeper Mir Ranjan Negi were in the panel of judges for photography.

G.S. Vivek of the Indian Express was chosen as the Cricket Writer of the Year 2007, Ashish Raje of Mumbai Mirror as Cricket Photographer of the Year 2007.

Nandakumar Marar (The Hindu) was awarded for the Best Interview of the Year.

The SJFI awards received support from Reliance Industries Limited, Indian Oil, and Orra.

The Sports Writing award-winners: Indian Sports Writer 2007: Nirmal Shekar (The Hindu); Sports (non-cricket) News Story: Nirmal Shekar (The Hindu); Feature Writer: Nirmal Shekar (The Hindu); Offbeat story writer: Harpreet Kaur Lamba (Asian Age); Columnist: Nirmal Shekar (The Hindu); Single Article: Sharda Ugra (India Today); Interview Writer: Nandakumar Marar (The Hindu).

Cricket Writing: News Story: G.S. Vivek (Indian Express); Feature Writer: Sharda Ugra (India Today); Interview Writer: Clayton Murzello (Mid-day); Indian Cricket Writer of the Year: G.S. Vivek (Indian Express).

The Sports Photography award-winners are: Sports (non-cricket) Portrait: Vipin Pawar (DNA); Action on the field: Vipin Pawar (DNA); Action off the field: Ritesh Uttamchandani (Hindustan Times); Indian Sports Photographer of the Year: Vipin Pawar (DNA).

Cricket Photography: Portrait: Ashok Nath Dey (Hindustan Times); Action on the field: Ashish Raje (Mumbai Mirror); Action off the field: Kunal Patil (Hindustan Times); Indian Cricket Photographer of the Year: Ashish Raje (Mumbai Mirror).

Best Headline: Hindustan Times; Best Sports Page: Hindustan Times.

Television Feature: NDTV 24 x 7; Television Anchors: Vikrant Gupta (AajTak), Gaurav Kalra (CNN-IBN).