Journalism Students Secure Top Positions in Lokmat Media Competitions

Three journalism students placed in competitions run by Lokmat Media. Neeraj Naruka took first place at Lokmat Media Lab, Upendra Yogi took second at the same event, and Kunika Singh placed third at Lokmat Newsroom Live.

Why the competitions matter

Journalism programs teach reporting, interviewing, and media presentation in the classroom, but competitions like these test something different: working under time pressure, alongside outside participants, with no do-overs. That's closer to how a newsroom actually operates than a graded assignment is, which is one reason faculty push students to enter.

Lokmat Media Lab and Lokmat Newsroom Live aren't identical formats. Newsroom Live, where Kunika Singh placed third, is built around simulating an actual newsroom, so participants are judged on how they research, edit, and get a story out under deadline, not just how they present it afterward. That points to editorial judgment and speed specifically, not only writing or presentation.

What the competitions actually test

Across formats like these, students are generally judged on research, clear writing, interviewing, story structure, and how well they hold up under time pressure. None of that shows up on a transcript. A student can do well in coursework and still freeze the first time they have to file a story in twenty minutes, or the reverse: struggle with theory but handle deadline pressure well.

That gap is exactly what competitions are useful for. A classroom assignment can be redone, revised, and submitted on the student's own schedule. A competition compresses all of that into a fixed window with no second attempt, which is a much closer preview of what a first job in a newsroom actually feels like.

Where these skills lead

The skills these events reward map fairly directly onto entry-level media jobs: reporting and editing roles at newspapers and digital outlets, TV production, radio, publishing, and increasingly content production and corporate communication, where the same research-and-writing-under-deadline skill set applies even though the output looks different.

Digital platforms have added more of these entry points than existed a decade ago. A student who places well in a competition like this isn't just collecting a credential for a resume, they're getting early evidence of whether they can actually do the job, which matters more to most editors than a grade does.

Why placing in more than one format is worth noting

These aren't three students who all won the same kind of contest. Neeraj Naruka and Upendra Yogi placed first and second at the same Media Lab event, which suggests the department had more than one strong entrant in that particular format. Kunika Singh's result came at a different competition, built around newsroom simulation rather than a lab setting. Together, that's evidence of depth across two different formats rather than one student's strength in one specific skill.

What this means for other students

For students still deciding whether these competitions are worth the time, the honest answer is that a placement isn't the main point. Most participants don't place at all, and that's fine, the exercise of preparing for a timed, judged competition is useful on its own, whether or not it ends in a ranking. What these three results show is that students who put in that preparation can compete against participants from outside their own program and come out ahead.

Congratulations

Congratulations to Neeraj Naruka, Upendra Yogi, and Kunika Singh on their results at the Lokmat Media competitions. All three represented Biyani Group of Colleges, and their placements are a good showing for the journalism department.