Image Courtesy:indiatoday.in
Pulitzer prize winning photojournalist Danish Siddiqui is no more. He died on the field, doing what he did best… covering the news. Siddiqui, one of the top photojournalists working with Reuters news agency, was killed on duty in Kandahar in Afghanistan on Friday, while covering clashes between Afghan forces and the Taliban. Here’s a look through his extraordinary life and career.
Siddiqui earned his postgraduate degree from Jamia Millia Islamia’s AJK-Mass Communication Research Centre in 2007, after his graduation in Economics from the same university. Years later, his photograph of a gun wielding right wing extremist threatening to shoot peacefully protesting students at the same university went viral across the world. Siddiqui had won the 2018 Pulitzer Prize, along with his team, for his documentation of the Rohingya refugees.
When Covid-19 raged across India, he bravely documented the tragedy as it escalated. Siddiqui’s drone shots of scores of pyres of Covid-19 victims who succumbed as the health system collapsed in Delhi, took the real story worldwide. Just like his photo of a Muslim man being beaten up by a Hindutva mob in the communal riots in Delhi, had done earler.
As India posted world record of COVID cases funeral pyres of people, who died due to the coronavirus disease were pictured at a crematorium ground in New Delhi, April 22, 2021. @Reuters #CovidIndia pic.twitter.com/bm5Qx5SEOm
— Danish Siddiqui (@dansiddiqui) April 22, 2021
Danish Siddiqui, risked his own life each time he ventured into ‘ground zero’ of the events that were unfolding that day. The powerful images he clicked, and the reports he authored, are timeless archives of the biggest events that have taken place in the country in recent years. Danish Siddiqui’s work showed how news reports are not mere statistics, that each dead, injured, displaced person mentioned in the report is a human being, a citizen.
He had covered the Covid crisis travelling to remote villages in other states, to major hospitals in Delhi, to the cremation grounds. He stayed with the story, till it reached its often tragic end.
Devi’s shrouded body lay on a bier, resting on a rock on the banks of a muddy Ganges. Her young son and husband watched in disbelief as they cremated Devi. Their life had changed forever within a day. pic.twitter.com/crbkd8byZi
— Danish Siddiqui (@dansiddiqui) May 27, 2021
Thanks for your kind words. I don’t think there is anything HEROIC about it. As journalists, this is what we signed up for. It’s our DUTY to document what is happening around us. https://t.co/zuNkyK8Mt4
— Danish Siddiqui (@dansiddiqui) April 26, 2021
He had told his colleagues at Reuters while covering Covid-19 that it was unlike anything seen before, “Here you don’t know who you’re fighting…You don’t know the enemy and you can’t see it.” His camera captured it all, like it had done in scores of high octane assignments before, one of which had made him a part of the team that earned the Pulitzer Prize in 2018. “In a way, I am a historian as well, that’s why I have saved all those emotions exhibited by the people in front of my camera for documentation,” Danish Siddiqui had reportedly told Indiatimes after winning. His coverage of Women’s Day at the Farmer’s Protest in Delhi was amazing too. His captions were touching.
Thousands of women wearing bright yellow scarves representing the colour of mustard fields and farmers union flag join protest sites on International Women’s Day in India. #FarmersProtest #InternationalWomensDay https://t.co/ggQnSaekLl pic.twitter.com/BZd5bqdlcY
— Danish Siddiqui (@dansiddiqui) March 8, 2021
His last assignment was to cover the escalating violence in Afghanistan. He had reported on social media that the Afghan Special Forces’ vehicle he had been traveling in had been hit, but he had luckily escaped. He had reported that he had been wounded in the arm by shrapnel while reporting on the clash. According to news reports the Afghan special forces team was fighting to reclaim a market area of Spin Boldak when “Siddiqui and a senior Afghan officer were killed in what was described as Taliban crossfire.”
The Humvee in which I was travelling with other special forces was also targeted by at least 3 RPG rounds and other weapons. I was lucky to be safe and capture the visual of one of the rockets hitting the armour plate overhead. pic.twitter.com/wipJmmtupp
— Danish Siddiqui (@dansiddiqui) July 13, 2021
According to news reports, “Siddiqui had been talking to shopkeepers when the Taliban attacked again”. Reuters President Michael Friedenberg and Editor-in-Chief Alessandra Galloni issued a statement hailing Danish as “an outstanding journalist, a devoted husband and father, and a much-loved colleague. Our thoughts are with his family at this terrible time.”
Never imagined that I would be a witness to these scenes in my hometown. Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) continues to wreak havoc in New Delhi, India’s national capital. Pictures taken on 23.04.21. @Reuters #CovidIndia pic.twitter.com/E2cFrMpUMR
— Danish Siddiqui (@dansiddiqui) April 24, 2021
Even in his death, he has scared the hate mongers. His lens captured and told the truth so strongly that the ‘lies and hate’ think they are liberated today. But @dansiddiqui is now an institution for all the budding and courageous photojournalists! He lives on.#danishsiddiqui pic.twitter.com/iLsDpGEbJO
— Sayema (@_sayema) July 16, 2021
While his landmark photos told the news story as it were, with honesty, raw facts, and empathy, it also earned him the wrath of self proclaimed right wing ‘nationalists’. An army of online right wing vigilantes had trolled him viciously when the photos, especially of the Covid-19 victims’ funerals. They targeted and accused him of ‘disrespecting’ Hindu funerals, and in their abuse, tried to divert attention from the fact of many deaths, some due to lack of oxygen, and hospital beds, being laid bare before the whole world.
When news of Danish Siddiqui being killed on duty in Afghanistan, these right wing trolls turned into online vultures and feasted on the tragery. While scores of politicians, journalists, activists, and thousands of citizens mourned the death of a brave and talented journalist, there were some who celebrated. Trolls, said the photojournalist, who has a young family, was killed because of bad ‘karma’. Others tried to veil their hate for the journalist, sharing unverified photographs reportedly of his body. Clearly, even in death, Danish Siddiqui laid bare the truth of how a polarised nation exposes its own flaws.
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