Prof. (Dr.) Farhat Basir Khan (Posted at D/o Design and Innovation)

Professor

Office Address:
AJK Mass Communication Research Centre,
|Jamia Millia Islamia,
New Delhi- 110025

Professor Farhat Basir Khan is a distinguished author, media practitioner, communication strategist, media & communication design innovator. He has over four decades of leadership experience in academic teaching, research, academic administration, skill enhancement and industry practice. Played a key role in setting up media departments, institutions & universities across the country. He has served Jamia Millia Islamia on several prestigious positions including the Maulana Abul Kalam Azad Chair Professor, Professor of Media and Communication and outside as Founder Director and Professor of the Academy for Photographic Excellence. Presently Prof Khan is setting up a cutting edge Department of Design & Innovation at Jamia Millia Islamia as its founding head & Professor of Media &  Communication Design Innovation.

He has been teaching the flagship MA Mass Communication program of the AJK MCRC from its first batch onwards. As the senior-most faculty member of the AJK Mass Communication Research Center (AJK MCRC), Prof. Khan has contributed in facilitating the ambitious development plan into one of Asia’s leading centres through curriculum development, delivering transformational education, building bridges between academia & industry and creating internationally recognized media productions.  

As one of the top innovators in visual communication in India, he has been championing design first and design-enabled innovation and education in the country. His interest in design has seen him visit the Netherlands several times to serve as the design jury of the IBC, Amsterdam, the world's largest convention on content, technology, and broadcasting. Closer home, he also served as a jury member for the design concept presentation for India Pavilion at World Expo 2020 Dubai. This is the Government of India official pavilion at the world largest expo which will see 25 million visitors. With a keen interest in design from early on in his career, Prof. Khan helped establish the Department of Architecture (that is now Faculty of Architecture), at Jamia Millia Islamia in the early 2000s and also helped design courses. There he also taught the first few batches of architecture students.  

Being a practising artist and academician, he also conceived and nurtured the Post Graduate Diploma in Still Photography & Visual Communication at AJK MCRC, serving as its founder coordinator since 2007.

Professor Khan has set up an Industry-led institution, the Academy of Photographic Excellence first as a consultant and later as Professor & Founder-Director. His work included designing contemporary and relevant programs co-led by academia and industry, creating state of the art labs, studios, and galleries.   

He also set up the School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Monad University working on a year-long project as a consultant, where his work included designing curriculum, studios & labs. He has also helped in the establishment of the APG Shimla University to name a few.

Prof. Khan has contributed immensely to the corporate life of the university, taking it to newer heights while putting India & Asia for the first time on the global map in photography at Cannes. Khan led the team which won the Sony World Photo Award for the very first time in 2009 beating teams representing all the other six continents and brought Rs 30 lakhs worth of equipment to Jamia. He has also represented the university as a steering committee member at Gannat, France for conceiving and setting up the first International conference on intangible cultural heritage (Festival of World Culture, by the National Association Cultures du Monde, an official representative of the intangible cultural heritage of UNESCO).

Prof Khan produced the 50-year commemorative audio-visual for UNICEF India and also for WHO SEAR for both their main commemorative Golden Jubilee events, which is a rare honour, chosen from amongst a global pool of experts. His experience in the field of Photojournalism, Multi-Media Production, Industrial and Studio Photography led him to spearhead marquee campaigns for leading advertising agencies, repositioning and reinventing well loved brands. Khan has led several productions, research and advocacy campaigns, putting the spotlight on strategic communication for development, gender sensitisation, mental health, preventing violence & nurturing scientific temper. His path-breaking works which put art and multimedia at the centre of societal change include, Photos4Peace, Votography, Sandesh to Soldiers and Chitthi Aayi Hai and lately on pandemic prevention and on popularising yoga for mindfulness.

He has served as an eminent jury member across the globe, including the Indian National Photo Awards, Govt of India, the International CMS Vatavaran Film Festival, FujiFilm Super Six, Film Photography and Animation Festivals at several other prestigious national institutions.

Prof. Khan has done seminal work in the nascent field of political visual communication contributing immensely to the discipline, with his path-breaking book “Game of Votes: Visual Media Politics and Elections in the Digital Era” published by SAGE, where he examines how visual campaigns and communication design has affected the evolution of democracy and election campaigns. This book has become one of the most important works in the current body of literature in visual and political communication internationally.

He also serves on the editorial board of the Journal of Scientific Temper (CSIR), Government of India, and Elsevier’s South Asian Journal of Law, Policy and Social Research in collaboration with Susan B. Anthony Center of the University of Rochester.

Prof. Khan is regularly engaged in consulting, selection, upgradation of new programs, recruitment of senior faculty members, mentoring and evaluating research. He has personally mentored many senior media professionals, filmmakers, editors, and journalists. Notable amongst them are Oscar winners as well as Pulitzer & World Photo awardees.

Prof Khan's interest however firmly lies in deepening democracy. His work has expanded the national and cybersecurity dialogue to include the end-user perspective, especially from marginalized communities, minorities and underrepresented stakeholder groups putting public interest at the core of policy formulation.

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