Padma Shri Balbir Dutt Media Fellowship Programme was announced under the joint aegis of Citizens Foundation and Ranchi Press Club (RPC).

Presiding over the programme, RPC President, Sanjay Mishra informed that the fellowship programme has been started to support and encourage efficient communication and broadcasting of development work. “The objective of the programme is to encourage promising journalists to achieve their goal of excellence. On the basis of selection, 3 people associated with journalism will be given a fellowship and an amount of Rs 50,000 will be made available per fellow. The duration of the fellowship will be one year,” he added.

Research topics for the fellowship are Arts and Culture, topics related to gender inequality and Role of Panchayat Raj Institution in the development of Jharkhand.

The submitted applications will be reviewed by the selection committee and selection will be made from the group of applicants.

The application forms will be available on the website of RPC from March 10. Along with Mishra, RPC Vice president, Pintu Dubey, Secretary, Javed Akhtar, Treasurer, Sushil Kumar Singh 'Mantu' and Executive members, Sanjay Kumar Ranjan, Parvez Qureshi, Kislay Sanu, Sunil Kumar Gupta and Rakesh Kumar were present in the program.

On the other hand, Secretary of Citizens Foundation, Ganesh Ready informed that in future also a media fellowship programme will be organized for photojournalists. Citizen Foundation's Nodal Officer Media Fellowship, Aman Kumar, Director Human Resources, Amit Shrivastava and  Priya Barla, Sajal Chakraborty played an excellent role in making the program a success.