Danish Siddiqui, a Pulitzer-winning Indian photojournalist, has reportedly been killed in Kandahar, Afghanistan.
Danish worked for the news agency Reuters. He was based out of Mumbai and had travelled to Afghanistan a few days ago to cover the fighting between government forces and the Taliban. He was embedded with the Afghan Special Forces.
In a series of tweets and a report published on July 13, Danish described a military operation to extract a wounded policeman trapped by the Taliban on the outskirts of Kandahar city for 18 hours.
Back home in India, Danish’s coverage of Covid deaths during the second wave of the pandemic early this year was instrumental in conveying the gravity of the crisis to the world.
He had also extensively covered the protests against the new citizenship law in late 2019, the Delhi carnage of 2020 and the violence in Kashmir.
Danish’s death was reported by the Afghan news network TOLOnews and confirmed by Farid Mumandzay, India’s envoy in Kabul, as well as the Afghanistan Journalists Center. Subsequently, Reuters confirmed the tragic news as well.
Deeply disturbed by the sad news of the killing of a friend, Danish Seddiqi in Kandahar last night. The Indian Journalist & winner of Pulitzer Prize was embedded with Afghan security forces. I met him 2 weeks ago before his departure to Kabul. Condolences to his family & Reuters. pic.twitter.com/sGlsKHHein
— Farid Mamundzay फरीद मामुन्दजई فرید ماموندزی (@FMamundzay) July 16, 2021
Danish won the Pulitzer Prize in 2018 along with Adnan Abidi for covering the Rohingya refugee crisis.
He had previously covered the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the protests in Hong Kong, and the Rohingya genocide. His work has appeared in such prominent news outlets as the New York Times, National Geographic Magazine, Guardian, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, CNN, Forbes, BBC, and Al Jazeera.
Before venturing into photojournalism, Danish worked as a reporter for the TV news channel India Today.
You can see Danish’s work here and here.
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