Udaipur photojournalist Tara Chand Gawaria has received a Certificate of Merit Award by the Photography Society of America in the recently concluded competition organized by Jodhana Photojournalist Society, Jodhpur.

30-year-old Tara Chand is the only journalist from Rajasthan to achieve this great honor. According to Ramji Vyas, President of the society, they had received a total of 9000 entries by 900 people from 40 countries. Tara Chand received the award in the category of photojournalism, along with Canadian Photographer Phillip Kwan.

The competition was organized into four categories: Open Section, Nature, Photojournalism and Travel. The Jury team consisted of Sudhir Saxena, Shiv Joshi, M.K Shastri and Vijendra Jaiswal.

The award winning photograph was of a Mercedes flung in the air with rocks scattered all around it and was taken at the shooting of the movie Dhamaal, at Ubeshwar slope in the year 2006. “It is a single shot picture and I still remember how I crossed two small peaks to reach the exact location to capture the photo,” said Tara Chand in conversation with UT.

Tara Chand Gawaria (in photo) has been working as a photojournalist with Dainik Bhaskar, a Hindi daily since 2004.