ICFJ Voices: Raisa Wickrematunge, Helping Journalists Cover Religious Intolerance

By: Taylor Dibbert |10/11/2024

Raisa Wickrematunge is deputy editor of the Himal Southasian. Through an ICFJ program, she trained and mentored South Asian journalists for ICFJ's "Stemming the Tide of Religious Intolerance" program.

She helped build a two-month course covering religious freedom reporting in the region. She subsequently worked as an instructor on the course - giving feedback to participants from India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka.

Afterwards, Wickrematunge mentored six participants and helped them produce meaningful pieces. Her work has facilitated high-quality reporting on religious freedom issues in the region.

"Several course participants shared that this was the first time they were talking about these issues and were given resources on how to cover these issues safely as well," she said.

Wickrematunge is based in Colombo.

This interview has been edited slightly.

What was the biggest outcome from participating in the program?
The biggest reward from this program was giving journalists from India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka a platform to speak about religious freedom issues in their countries. Religious intolerance is somewhat a taboo topic in South Asia, particularly as each of the three countries has a history of violence targeting religious minorities.

I often said that I learned from the participants, even while providing guidance, as they shared insights about how religious intolerance impacted their reporting. This was particularly the case when the participant journalists were from marginalized or relatively rural communities. Apart from this, we were also able to mentor journalists and empower them to report on religious intolerance, which again is a longstanding ingrained issue which does not receive much coverage in each of the three countries. We were able to provide reporters with the tools to uncover hidden stories, from land issues to caste discrimination within religious communities to state oppression of religious minorities to blasphemy laws and killings. And they often published in local languages as well to ensure wider reach.

Another great outcome was seeing cross-country collaboration between course participants who sometimes worked together on a story about a common issue that they shared. Some of the journalists also created a WhatsApp group where they shared their work and professional resources, career opportunities and more with each other.

Why is it so important right now to provide the kind of support to journalists that ICFJ does, especially in South Asia?
Religious intolerance is a topic that doesn't receive much dedicated support or media coverage. Several course participants shared that this was the first time they were talking about these issues and were given resources on how to cover these issues safely as well. While there are many courses on physical safety or digital security, this was the first course ICFJ had done that was specific to religious intolerance, and it also pulled together material from a number of specializations to provide journalists with a really comprehensive understanding of how to report on religious intolerance, covering topics ranging from investigative tools to trauma journalism to ethics and more.

For many of the participants, this was their first time reporting on the topic, and they often said they hoped to continue covering the topic in future. Some journalists also shared that there was a dearth of professional development opportunities for them in their newsrooms, and this provided them with the chance to develop professionally and connect with other journalists in other countries, too. This was particularly the case when the journalists were from less central areas (e.g. Swat in Pakistan or from the north of Sri Lanka).

The fact that there was trilingual translation throughout the course also allowed us to reach more journalists, and there is a dearth of resources in local languages on topics such as religious intolerance.

What are you currently working on that you're excited about?
I am currently working to build the audience for Himal Southasian's weekly newsletter, "Southasia Weekly," and amplifying our monthly online documentary screenings, Screen Southasia, which brings Southasian documentaries to a wider audience, as well as working on a number of longform articles on various topics. Every day is different, and it's exciting to be working with like-minded people to amplify South Asian content from South Asian journalists.

Why did you choose to become a journalist?
For me, it was partly because I was surrounded by people working in the industry. I started out at the Sri Lankan newspaper, the Sunday Leader, which was known for its investigative reporting, where my uncle, Lasantha Wickrematunge, was the editor. He encouraged me to join the newspaper and along with the editorial team trained me on the job (I did not study journalism but rather, learned on the job).

I found that I enjoyed the variety of stories I could cover, working in a small newsroom - one day I might be standing atop a rubbish dump on the outskirts of Colombo and the next I would be in Parliament, writing the lobby copy or interviewing an MP.

I enjoyed the thrill of chasing down a story or covering a protest as it unfolded, and gaining insight into political and social issues impacting Sri Lankans. Being a journalist gave me a sense of purpose that continues to drive me even as I have moved more into helping journalists shape their own stories about the South Asian region.

What's one piece of advice you'd give to an aspiring journalist?
There's many that come to mind, but maybe the primary one would be to always remain conscious of the power that you wield as a reporter. Journalists face various types of pressure from deadline pressure to financial pressure and also editorial pressure based on no-go or taboo topics, and this can be easy to forget when you're reporting on sensitive issues including on religious intolerance, which often involves speaking to religious minorities or people who are marginalized by poverty, caste discrimination, etc.

It's important I think to remain empathetic to people's suffering even while you're telling their stories, and even as you're trying to ensure balanced coverage. I believe it's important to be open, curious and empathetic when pursuing stories,and I think that once I shifted my lens this way it resulted in better stories. I also think tenacity is underrated when it comes to journalism. A lot of the time people see journalism as being a very glamorous or adventurous job, but a large part of it is often simply doggedly calling a contact once an hour on the hour to try to get a comment to feed into the story. It's important not to give up at the first obstacle - you never know what might happen if you persevere!