AP Photographers Win Pulitzer Award For Coverage Of Lockdown In Indian-Occupied Kashmir

Associated Press news agency's photographers Dar Yasin, Mukhtar Khan and Channi Anand have been honoured with the 2020 Pulitzer Prize in feature photography for their photos from Indian-Occupied Kashmir during the coronavirus lockdown. Reporting from a war-zone and overcoming countless hurdles in sending the photos across in a curfew ridden state, these three have outdone themselves.

The Associated Press reports that prize winners were announced virtually on Monday owing to the coronavirus outbreak.

In a statement on their website following the announcement, Pulitzer said the Kashmiri photographers were selected for their "striking images of life" in the disputed Himalayan territory.

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The Pulitzers are generally regarded as the highest honour that United States based journalists and organisations can receive.

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Twitter has come out in support of their hardships and extraordinary coverage midst the lockdown. Their work shows police arrests, paramilitary action, and their daily lives of unrest and protests.

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"It was always cat-and-mouse," Yasin recalled on Monday in an email. "These things made us more determined than ever to never be silenced."

Yasin and Khan are based in Kashmir's main city of Srinagar, while Anand is based in the Jammu district.

Anand said the award left him speechless. "I was shocked and could not believe it," he said.

The AP's president and CEO Gary Pruitt said their work was "important and superb".

"Thanks to the team inside Kashmir, the world was able to witness a dramatic escalation of the long struggle over the region's independence."