Hyderabad, India, 26 September 2018

For immediate release

The Quint, The Scroll and ABP among WAN-IFRA's South Asian Digital Media Awards 2018 winners

WAN-IFRA India Annual Conference made a comeback in Hyderabad this year, with over 300 publishing executives from over 25 countries, to discuss digital-first approach in newsrooms, the future of news publishing, and print media trends.

The 26th annual conference, WAN-IFRA India 2018, is being held on September 26 and 27 and is co-sponsored by The Indian Newspaper Society.

The much awaited third edition of the ‘South Asian Digital Media Awards’ was presented at the event and over 30 media organisations were awarded under 10 different categories.

The awards, a joint initiative by WAN-IFRA and Google, recognise best practice innovation in digital publishing worldwide. The awards are presented in South Asia, Asia, Middle East, Africa, Europe and Latin America. The Gold award winners will subsequently compete for the World Digital Media Awards that will be announced in Glasgow in June during the 71st World News Media Congress 2019.

This year, The Scroll won the coveted Gold award in ‘Best in News Website’ category. The Quint bagged the gold for ‘Talking Stalking’ under the ‘Best Innovation to Engage Youth Audiences’ category. The ‘Best Digital Start-Up’ saw two Silver award winners - Sakal Media Private Limited for the Agrowon App and The Hindu for Briefcase.

This year's winners are thus:

Best Branded Content Project

Gold: YoursWisely by Indian Express for Medtronic - World Hearing Day

Silver: Quintillion Media Pvt. Ltd for The Quint and Madhya Pradesh Tourism

Bronze: Jang Media Group for The News HBL PSL

Best Data Visualisation

Gold: NDTV Convergence for NDTV Elections

Silver: Dhaka Tribune for The hungry children of Mother Ganges

Bronze: BBC News Indian Languages for BBC India Visual Journalism team

Best Digital Marketing Campaign

Gold: ABP Pvt Ltd for AnandaUtsav 2017 Digital Campaign

Silver: The Daily Star for "Praner Vasha"- Mother Language Day Special

Bronze: Amarujala.com for Amar Ujala Samwad

Best Digital News Start-up

Gold: www. madrascourier.com (Madras Courier)

Silver: Sakal Media Private Limited (Agrowon App) and

Silver: The Hindu (Briefcase)

Bronze: Sakal Media Private Limited (Sarkarnama)

Best in Lifestyle, Sports, Entertainment Website or Mobile Services

Gold: Arré for Arré India

Silver: NDTV Convergence for Swirlster

Bronze: The Hindu Group for SportstarLive

Best in Social Media Engagement

Gold: ABP Pvt Ltd for Ebela.in 2017 Festive Song

Silver: Quintillion Media Pvt. Ltd for My Report

Bronze: BloombergQuint and Quintype for Integrating WhatsApp Communication for Business, and

Bronze: Mathrubhumi Printing & Publishing Co Ltd for Mathrubhumi women's day special - addressing gender bias on social media

Best Innovation to Engage Youth Audiences

Gold: Quintillion Media Pvt. Ltd for Talking Stalking

Silver: Jang Media Group for Jang VR

Bronze: The Indian Express Group for inuth.com

Best News Website or Mobile Service

Gold: Scroll.in (Scroll.in)

Silver: BBC News Indian Languages (BBC Hindi)

Bronze: Malayala Manorama Company Ltd (Malayala Manorama News App)

Best Reader Revenue Initiative

Gold: Swarajya and Quintype for Preserving Indic Heritage

Silver: Business Standard Private Limited for Business Standard Premium - Digital Subscriptions

Bronze: Dainik Bhaskar Digital for Autobot

Best Use of Online Video (including VR)

Gold: Scroll.in for Your Morning Fix

Silver: BBC News Indian Languages for Crossing the Sky

Bronze: Quintillion Media Pvt. Ltd for Rape is Consensual: Inside Haryana’s Rape Culture

ABOUT WAN-IFRA INDIA 2018

More information on the awards can be found at wan-ifra.org/sdma

Complete details of the programme are available at www.wan-ifra.org/india2018

The conference can be followed on Facebook at www.facebook.com/wanifraindiaconference and on Twitter with the hashtag #wii2018

For a calendar of upcoming WAN-IFRA events, please visit events.wan-ifra.org

ABOUT WAN-IFRA

WAN-IFRA is the World Association of Newspapers and News Publishers. Its mission is to protect the rights of journalists across the world to operate free media and provide its members with professional services to help their business prosper in a digital world and perform their crucial role in open societies. With formal representative status at the United Nations, UNESCO and the Council of Europe, it derives its authority from its global network of leading news publishing companies and technology entrepreneurs, and its legitimacy from its 80 national association members representing 18,000 publications in 120 countries. www.wan-ifra.org.

Contact - Inquiries

For enquiries, please contact:

Magdoom Mohamed, Managing Director, WAN-IFRA South, Chennai, India ([email protected]) or

Suresh Babu, Asst. Manager, WAN-IFRA South Asia, Chennai, India ([email protected])