Activities : Workshops & Seminars

Workshops and Seminars

Most of the working Tibetan journalists are not professionally trained. Hence there is a need to have workshops and seminars from time to time to educate the journalists the smooth functioning of the media and to safe guard the Freedom of Speech, enshrined in the Article 12 of the Charter of the Tibetan government-in-exile.

The Association of Tibetan Journalists organises workshops and training to offer Tibetan journalists, and others interested, to discharge professional journalism. Three workshops have been conducted so far with the financial assistance from Friedrich Naumann Stiftung which were helpful in achieving higher level of efficiency by our journalists.

The workshops are important in view of the developing stage of our democracy. Peculiar problems and situations give our journalism ambiguous positions. We need more such workshops and training to advance the skills and efficiency of our journalists and the media itself.

We need your help to conduct such workshops and trainings. Contact us for sponsorships, training materials, expertise, etc.

The Third Seminar

The third seminar was held on the 5 July 2003 in Dharamsala. The seminar was sponsored by Tibetan Parliamentary Policy Research Centre, New Delhi. The journalists discussed the daily chores and problems of the Tibetan media. On realising the need to have a Tibetan Media Rules and Regulations, the journalists resolved to commission a drafting committee so as to present the same to the Tibetan government to enforce it as a law to avoid Tibetan media facing peculiar situations.

The club has commissioned Karma Choephel, the former chairman of the Assembly of Tibetan People's Deputies and also a current ATPD member, and Tsering Tsomo, a mass-communications graduate and currently serving in Tibetan Women's Association, to draft the regulations. The first draft is expected to come out by March 2004.

Letter to the Chinese Ambassador to India

In this third meeting of the Tibetan journalists, the following letter was sent to the Chinese ambassador in New Delhi to allow them to go to Tibet to cover the current situation.

5 July 2003

Hua Jundua
Embassy of the People's Republic of China
Kautilya Marg
New Delhi 110 021

Your Excellency,

In view of the People's Republic's pride in developing Tibet economically and culturally, and protecting the environment of the plateau, we, the Tibetan journalists, request permission to visit the Tibetan regions of China and produce up-to-date media coverage.

Television and Print media journalists from around the world were invited by the PRC to tour Tibet in August 2002. There was substantial coverage on Tibet's unique culture as a result of that official media tour.

As Tibetans residing in India, we also request the right to travel across the Tibetan plateau and record the ground realities of China’s development and conservation policies on film and in print.

We look forward to a favourable reply from you.

Lobsang Wangyal,
President