Teresa Rehman is an award-winning journalist based in Northeast India. Born in the picturesque hillstation Shillong, she started her career with India Today magazine in New Delhi. After a brief sojourn in Delhi, she returned to her roots and has been consistently trying to highlight the myriad hues of this hitherto unexplored and conflict-torn region of the country. She reports on seven states of the Indian union -- Assam, Manipur, Meghalaya, Tripura, Nagaland, Arunachal Pradesh and Mizoram.

The region for her is a 'journalist's paradise, full of untold stories of men, women and children waiting to be told. As many journalists based here, she has flirted with danger while visiting militant camps in the region. She has also done stories on child soldiers being recruited by the militant groups in Northeast India.

She has also written stories of hope which has revealed the resilience of the people of the Northeast. She has worked on pertinent issues like impact of militancy on women and children, health, education, rural employment and the disabled. She is particularly interested in issues related to HIV-AIDS, water and sanitation. She also moderates two listservs: Red Ribbon Media and The Sanitation Scribes.

She has won accolades for her work. She has been awarded the WASH Media Awards 2009-2010 in the English category. This award which honours the best in water supply, sanitation and hygiene journalism is sponsored by the Water Supply and Sanitation Collaborative Council (WSSCC) and the Stockholm International Water Institute (SIWI). For details see http://www.wsscc.org/en/media/wash-media-awards/2009-2010/index.htm. She was honoured with the Ramnath Goenka Excellence in Journalism Award for two consecutive years (2008-09 and 2009-10) for the category 'Reporting on J&K and the Northeast (Print) (http://www.indianexpress.com/news/between-the-lines/651199/0). She was also runners-up in the Media Reporting on Development contest organised by the Institute of Development Studies, UK.

She was earlier awarded the Sanskriti Award 2009 for Excellence in Journalism (www.sanskritifoundation.org) and the Seventh Sarojini Naidu Prize 2007 for Best Reporting on Panchayati Raj by The Hunger Project (www.thp.org). She was also honoured with the Kunjabala Devi Memorial Award for Investigative Journalism on Women's issues by The Assam Tribune group in 2003.

Widely-travelled, she feels that everyday is a learning experience. She has recently completed a course on Reporting HIV/AIDS by Thomson Reuters Foundation at Nairobi, Kenya. She has worked with leading media houses of the country like The Telegraph and Tehelka newsmagazine. As an independent journalist, she now writes for prominent national and international media organisations. She blogs at http://thesanitationscribes.blogspot.com and http://teresarehman.blogspot.com/.

For her, unveiling the mystifying facets of this trouble-scarred region has been cathartic - a realisation that underneath the turmoil lies a hope for peace.