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Media personnel and news trainers at the fact-check programme pose for a group photograph on Saturday in Kohima.[/caption]
Our Correspondent
Kohima, March 2 (EMN): As part of the Google News Initiative India Training Network, a workshop on newsgathering and analysis, ‘Poll Check: Covering India’s Election,’ was conducted for media personnel and working journalists. The event was conducted at Hotel Eastgate, in Kohima on Saturday.
The training series aimed at supporting journalist in covering India’s election, particularly in the forthcoming Lok Sabha elections. The initiative was launched by the Google News Initiative, in partnership with data researchers DataLeads and non-profit news data organisation Internews.
The training will be conducted in 30 cities, including Kohima, across the country.
According to Google’s blog on the initiative, the training network aims to support journalists from across India in their fight against misinformation. It will aim to provide in-depth and hands-on verification training to 8000 journalists across English and six other
Indian languages over the next one year. The training will equip them with best-in-class skills required to debunk fake news, the search tech giant says.
Some of the topics of the training included online verification and fact-checking exercises to combat fake news; and digital security and safety, and how to use YouTube to cover elections.
Senior journalist and trainer for the poll check for Kohima, Kallol Dey, who was also the resource person, said that the training aimed at identifying fake news and to strive for quality journalism in this age of digital technology.
As journalists, one should be able to identify what fake news is and what is not, said Dey in his address to the media personnel on Saturday.
Dey said that “gut sense” and “good sense” are key ingredients to the fact-checking process. He urged the participants to rely on these senses.
Asserting that social media is a powerful tool in spreading information, he cautioned them to be wary about the threat that accompanies it.
“The moment you are on social media, you’re at risk,” Dey warned. The participants also got a session about YouTube Live, which is an essential tool in disseminating real time happenings without manipulating content. He also spoke about the ways to verify fake pictures and videos.
The senior journalist, who is one of the 240 selected journalists and journalism educators of the GNI India Training Network, was trained by Google in 2018.
The trainers are currently conducting trainings across the country and in newsrooms.