NEW DELHI, FEBRUARY 23 Accepting the first International Press Institute India award for Outstanding Work in Journalism for its ‘‘fearless coverage of the Gujarat tragedy and its aftermath,’’ The Indian Express today said it would set up a fellowship in the memory of IIT engineer Satyendra Dubey who was murdered after he complained of corruption in Bihar.

Announcing this after accepting the award from Vice President Bhairon Singh Shekhawat at Vigyan Bhavan this evening, Editor-in-Chief and CEO Shekhar Gupta said that the Rs 2-lakh award money would go towards building a corpus for the fellowship for a student at Dubey’s alma mater, IIT Kanpur. This would, he hoped, ensure that the ideals Dubey lived —and died— by continue to inspire future generations.

‘‘Unfortunately, there is no way to know what Mr Dubey would have told us about our ongoing coverage of Gujarat,’’ said Gupta, ‘‘but we know for sure what he would have wanted us to do: to find out the truth. And to tell the truth no matter what the risk.’’

In fact, a ‘‘watchful media,’’ said Shekhawat, delivering the keynote address, was needed to ‘‘ensure that political parties are encouraged to commit themselves to the agenda of good governance.’’

Congratulating The Indian Express, the Vice President said: ‘‘I would also urge you to be the prime mover in ensuring success of mission for improved governance.’’ And that coming elections would provide an opportunity to have a Lok Sabha committed to good governance and development issues.

Shekhawat prefaced—and added significant weight—to this hope by saying that after 50 years in public life, he had now the privilege to hold a Constitutional position that transcended political party lines.

Referring to the media’s role as a watchdog to take on corruption, the Vice-President mentioned the recent scams that have been unearthed from non-banking finance companies, securities scam, fodder scam and the stamp paper or the Telgi scam.

‘‘We have to find ways to move towards an honest and ethics-based polity as also an efficient and corruption-free administration,’’ he said, adding that the youth of the country, numbering more than 50 crore are the biggest stakeholders in the future. ‘‘Let us not fail the youth, let us not fail our country and let us not fail ourselves,’’ Shekhawat said.

Welcoming the guests, IPI India chairperson Shobhana Bhartia said that the award is a way of saying ‘‘thank you’’ for not only raising the bar of journalism but also as an incentive for trying to reach it.

‘‘(In journalism) we need to establish benchmarks of high standards,’’ Bhartia said. ‘‘We felt it was imperative to honour and recognise an institution.’’

The profession of journalism worldwide, she said, is going through valuable introspection in a turbulent news year—she referred to The New York Times and the BBC—adding that some ‘‘unhealthy trends’’ were being witnessed in the media here, such as selling news space.

Applauding The Indian Express, she said it ‘‘consistently covered the Gujarat riots during the first two months and then continued to focus attention’’ to uncover the whitewash.

That the award came in the centenary year of The Indian Express founder Ram Nath Goenka’s birth anniversary was an appropriate coincidence, she said, because he was instrumental in bringing in courageous journalism.

Underlining the importance of press freedom in a democracy and the substantive legal grounding for such a right, National Human Rights Commission Chief Justice A S Anand—who also chaired the jury—said: ‘‘The need for freedom of press has been a core issue in Indian politics. The experience of some of our neighbours shows that this is a great feat.’’ Anand, too, voiced concern over what he called the ‘‘commercialisation and trivialisation’’ of news.

IPI-International vice-chairman Philip Mathew said the IPI India was the first chapter which had instituted an annual award to recognise the best work done by a media organisation or journalist in furtherance of public interest. He added that the idea of the award was conceived at the IPI World Congress held in Delhi in 2001.