Grants – Harsha Vadlamani https://sriharsha.in Photojournalist, Filmmaker in Delhi and Hyderabad, India Fri, 08 Aug 2025 11:14:00 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.9.4 https://sriharsha.in/wp-content/uploads/2026/03/favicon-200x200.png Grants – Harsha Vadlamani https://sriharsha.in 32 32 Freshwater Initiative Grant from the National Geographic Society https://sriharsha.in/freshwater-initiative-grant-from-the-national-geographic-society/ Mon, 10 Jul 2023 04:54:58 +0000 https://sriharsha.in/?p=27634 Harsha Vadlamani Photojournalist, Documentary Photographer and Filmmaker in India
Water being drawn from a tubewell at a farm in Sukhpura Maur in Barnala, Punjab, India. December 09, 2019.

I am thrilled to announce that I have received my second grant from the National Geographic Society. This grant from the Society’s Freshwater Initiative will allow me to continue working on my project documenting the impact of the Green Revolution in Punjab, India. In the coming months, I will spend a lot of time in Punjab, paying special attention to the region’s groundwater crisis and rise in cancers.

I am also deeply honoured to now join the National Geographic Explorer community, where I will have the opportunity to learn and collaborate with some of the most exceptional researchers and storytellers.

Please follow the project on my website here.

 

]]> See how rural India has been overrun by the pandemic’s second wave // National Geographic https://sriharsha.in/see-how-rural-india-has-been-overrun-by-the-pandemics-second-wave-national-geographic/ Mon, 21 Jun 2021 05:04:46 +0000 https://sriharsha.in/?p=27637 For the past few weeks, I have been travelling through remote parts of central India, documenting how the second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic affected remote rural and Indigenous communities. The situation is dire—the public health infrastructure is inadequate, and several groups of volunteer doctors and medical staff have been stepping in to ensure that these communities receive care.

My work so far, documenting the incredible work of Jan Swasthta Sahyog and Sangwari in Chattisgarh and MAHAAN Trust in Melghat, Maharashtra, has appeared in the National Geographic alongside Sibi Arasu’s words. Please read the article here and view the entire body of work here.

Harsha Vadlamani Photojournalist, Documentary Photographer and Filmmaker in India
National Geographic, June 2021.

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]]> COVID-19 Emergency Fund for Journalists Grant from the National Geographic Society https://sriharsha.in/covid-19-emergency-fund-for-journalists-grant-from-the-national-geographic-society/ Tue, 20 Apr 2021 11:05:06 +0000 https://sriharsha.in/?p=27689 Kalabai Maravi, a 50-year-old health worker trained by the Jan Swasthya Sahyog, during her door-to- door monitoring of villagers for COVID-19 symptoms in Bamhani inside the core zone of the Achanakmar Tiger Reserve in Mungeli, Chhattisgarh. May 11, 2021.
Kalabai Maravi, a 50-year-old health worker trained by the Jan Swasthya Sahyog, during her door-to- door monitoring of villagers for COVID-19 symptoms in Bamhani inside the core zone of the Achanakmar Tiger Reserve in Mungeli, Chhattisgarh. May 11, 2021.

Earlier this month, on the last day of my COVID-19 isolation, I applied for a grant from the National Geographic Society. I just received the news that the Society has awarded me a COVID-19 Emergency Fund for Journalists grant.

While 69% of India lives in its villages, the number of public hospital beds available to them is just 2,65,275. Rural parts of India, which were largely spared by the first wave of the pandemic, were not so lucky during the second wave. Reports have been trickling in of COVID-affected adivasis from Chhattisgarh who were turned away by city hospitals to return and suffer in their own villages, of quacks running typhoid tests on patients with COVID symptoms, and more.

Over the next few months, join me as I travel through remote, rural and adivasi-populated parts of India like with negligible healthcare infrastructure to document the impact of COVID on rural India, and also the inspiring work of several idealist doctors working there.

]]> Honourable Mention: Imagely Fund 2016 https://sriharsha.in/honourable-mention-imagely-fund-2016/ Mon, 20 Feb 2017 12:41:37 +0000 http://sriharsha.in/?p=15928 The drought of 1972 is a reference point to calculate the age of Vyjayanta Ithape, 70, who gave birth to a son and had also lost her husband that year. Chincholi in Beed, Maharashtra, where she lives alone, has been relying on water tankers for the past three years, even during the monsoon."This one is unlike any other drought in the past, we have grain to eat but no water to drink." March 21, 2016.
The drought of 1972 is a reference point to calculate the age of Vyjayanta Ithape, 70, who gave birth to a son and had also lost her husband that year. Chincholi in Beed, Maharashtra, where she lives alone, has been relying on water tankers for the past three years, even during the monsoon.”This one is unlike any other drought in the past, we have grain to eat but no water to drink.” March 21, 2016.

I’m stoked to receive an honourable mention at the Imagely Fund 2016 for my work on the drought in the Marathwada region of India. The series is part of Raiyatnama, a longer project documenting agrarian crises and rural distress in various parts of India.

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