- Pritzker Fellows
- Former Fellows
- Rana Ayyub
Rana Ayyub
Investigative Journalist from India
Rana Ayyub is an Indian investigative journalist and global opinions writer at The Washington Post. She has worked as a reporter, editor and columnist with some of the leading publications in India and internationally. Her pieces appear in TIME, The New York Times, The Guardian and Foreign Policy, among other publications. Rana and her work have been profiled by publications including The New Yorker, The Atlantic, TIME, The Guardian and The Observer, among others. She was an editor with Tehelka, a leading investigative magazine in India. Rana has reported on religious violence, extrajudicial killings by the state, insurgency in Kashmir, terrorism by the Tamil tigers in Sri Lanka and authored an international bestseller, Gujarat Files: Anatomy of a Cover-Up. The book details the undercover investigation when, posing as a film student at the American Film Institute Conservatory, Rana went underground with 8 body cameras to expose what she describes as the complicity of the Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi in state-sponsored genocide in the year 2002.
In a career spanning sixteen years, Rana has been awarded the Sanskriti award for integrity and excellence in journalism by the President of India. In 2017, she was the recipient of the Global Shining Light award for investigative journalism and was named Most Resilient Global Journalist of 2018 at the Peace Palace in Hague. Also in 2018, the United Nations allotted six special rapporteurs to the Indian government to protect her safety, a first for an individual case in India. In 2019 and 2022, she was named as one of the ten most endangered global journalists in the world. In 2020, she was the recipient of the McGill Medal for Journalistic Courage.
She is presently working on a memoir and an adaptation of her book, Gujarat Files. In 2022, for the second time in three years, the UN wrote to India to protect her from state-enabled attacks and persecution in response to her journalism. In April of 2022, Rana was awarded the Overseas Press Club of America Award for the best international commentary. She is 38 and lives in Mumbai with her family.
Seminars
"Living & Reporting in the World’s Largest Democracy"
As a citizen, a journalist, and a practicing Muslim, I have been reporting from India and other neighboring countries for the last fifteen years. I have closely observed the functioning and decline of democratic values. I have witnessed authoritarian regimes, dictators, fascist and xenophobic ideas take over nations that once took pride in their liberal and pluralistic values. From India to the United States, from the world’s largest democracy to the world’s greatest democracy, how do journalists around the world report this new world order? Can democracy survive one of the worst assaults in its history? If the World’s largest democracy (India) goes down under, ripples will be felt across the world. In India, like other authoritarian regimes, journalists are the new enemy of the state. How do journalists report this churn while they are intimidated, threatened and silenced? We’ll discuss India and talk to journalists and experts from around the world to understand this new world order.
What has happened to the India of Nehru and Gandhi, the freedom fighters and the visionaries who paved way for a democracy that could cut through caste, religious and sectarian divide? On the 75th anniversary of the Indian Independence Day when the nation was asked to proudly display the national flag, the government released eleven men accused of gangraping a pregnant Muslim woman and other female members of her family, as well as killing her three-year-old daughter and eleven members of her family. Why were the accused let off? Because the victim was a Muslim. How has religious nationalism torn at the fabric of democracy? Can the world’s largest democracy survive? Never before in her history has India ever been more polarized with some experts saying that the country is beyond redemption. What’s next?
How can journalists who are relentlessly targeted continue to hold the state accountable? Journalists around the world are being killed, silenced, incarcerated, charged with sedition and barred from leaving their countries. Today, India ranks at the 150th position in the World Press Freedom Index, its lowest ever rating. How did India get there? What other countries are targeting journalists, and how do editors and publishers protect their journalists from the assault and incarceration of journalists? From my experience to that of Jamal Khashoggi and other writers at the Washington Post, we’ll discuss speaking up and standing up for journalists under attack with an editor who supports them.
Special Guest: Eli Lopez, Senior Editor & Global Opinions at The Washington Post
I recently wrote in an article about India for the Washington Post, "If the world’s largest democracy goes down under, ripples will be felt around the world." We’ll discuss these ripples and what other nations can do about them. For example, the United States has taken a ‘moral’ position in the war on Ukraine but has a dismal record in calling out human rights violations and genocidal calls in nations it refers to as ‘strategic allies.' Narendra Modi went from being denied a visa to the US in 2005 because of his failure in Gujarat to being honored by the Gates Foundation – how, and why, has the narrative shifted? What role does the world community play in the strengthening or weakening of democracy?
Special Guest: Ben Rhodes, former Deputy National Security Advisor for Strategic Communications and Speechwriting Under President Barack Obama
We’ll discuss the similarities and solidarity among authoritarian leaders worldwide from Putin to Narendra Modi. What goes into the making of a demagogue? What are their tools? How do they reinforce each other? As fascism returns to the center stage in Europe with the election of far-right leaders, is this churn here to stay?
Special Guest: Dexter Filkins, Staff Writer for The New Yorker
In the year 2010, soon after my investigation landed Prime Minister Narendra Modi's aide and home minister behind bars, I went undercover with eight hidden cameras on my body to investigate the violence against Muslims in Gujarat in 2002. I was posing as Maithili Tyagi, a Hindu Nationalist from America and student at the American Film Institute Conservatory. I met high-ranking officials who said on camera that Prime Minister Narendra Modi, when he was the head of the state of Gujarat in 2002, had looked the other way as a Muslim genocide was underway. Since the publication I was working for came under pressure at the time to not publish my investigation, I published the transcripts of the taped conversations in the form of a book titled Gujarat Files which has sold more than seven hundred thousand copies worldwide. In this seminar, I will be talking about the investigation: the reasons I went undercover, the repercussions of publishing my book and the price my family and I have paid, and continue to pay, for reporting on Narendra Modi and the everyday authoritarianism in India. We’ll start the seminar with a ten-minute video recording from the spy camera I used undercover, the first time this footage will ever be played for an audience. I will talk about my journey as a Muslim and as a journalist that runs parallel with India's own path to increasing communalism and fascist politics.
We’ll have a discussion with a voice from India who will give us some examples of efforts in civil society and in the media that are hopeful signs for India’s future. These are activists and journalists who have been relentlessly targeted by the Modi government but continue to hold the candle in a time of despair.
Special Guest: Afreen Fatima, Student Leader from India Pursuing an MA in Linguistics from Jawaharlal Nehru University, National Secretary of the Fraternity Movement and Prominent Muslim Voice Against the Anti-Muslim Policies of the Indian Government
The killing of journalist Shirin Abu Akleh yet again reminded the world of unequal attention to unpopular stories, often the context for which is decided by the white West. Why do human rights violations in some countries get more attention than others? Are ‘human rights’ decided by the strategies and interests of the West? Is there double speak by the West and the international media over human rights violations in countries that are witnessing state-sanctioned persecution of minorities?
Special Guest: Rula Jebreal, Visiting Professor at The University of Miami, Journalist, Author and Foreign Policy Analyst