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Google News Initiative: Introducing pan-India training series for journalists covering the upcoming elections



The Google News Initiative, in partnership with DataLEADS, is thrilled to open registration for PollCheck: Covering India’s Election, an online training series to support journalists in India covering elections. We are hosting these trainings in five states in English and in local languages, with a special boot camp for community radio stations.

Map showing Google News Initiative training network

In partnership with DataLEADS, the Google News Initiative aims to offer training on photo and video verification, YouTube for election coverage, data visualization for elections and how journalists can keep their online accounts and sources safe.The Google News Initiative India Training Network was launched in July 2018, onboarding 240 trainers via seven trainings of trainers in different Indian languages. Since its inception the network has trained more than 25,000 journalists, media educators, journalism students and fact-checkers across India, building a robust Pan-India fact-checking network by empowering journalists and media educators with fact-checking tools and approaches. In 2020, the network also offered special training series for newsrooms, media organizations and press clubs to help them monitor social media and verify online content for their news source. The training was conducted at Zee Media, ANI, Punjab Kesari, the Shillong Times, Chandigarh Press Club, Guwahati Press Club, Gujarat Media Club among others organisations.    

Combating misinformation in India

This PollCheck training series is open to journalists, journalism students, media educators, bloggers and community radio station professionals. Your participation will be confirmed and a Zoom link will be shared via email.For more information and to register, please click here.

PollCheck: Covering India’s Election

Location / Date / Time:

  • West Bengal | 13 March, 2021 | 10:30 AM - 4:00 PM
  • Assam | 15 March 2021 | 10:30 AM - 4:00 PM
  • Kerala | 17 March 2021 | 10:30 AM - 4:00 PM
  • Community Radio Boot Camp | 20 March 2021 | 10:30 AM - 4:00 PM
  • Tamil Nadu | 23 March 2021 | 10:30 AM - 4:00 PM
  • Puducherry | 24 March 2021 | 10:30 AM - 4:00 PM