The Centre for Journalism and Mass Communication (CJMC), Visva-Bharati, in collaboration with UNICEF, has initiated a national academic and professional engagement under the project titled “Reimagining Development Journalism: Ethics, Evidence and Public Purpose in India’s Changing Landscape.” The initiative aims to promote ethical, evidence-based and community-rooted journalism through sustained dialogue, capacity building and institutional collaboration. As the first activity under this project, the National Roundtable on Development Journalism: Establishing the Visva-Bharati Hub for Evidence-Based Media Practice was held on 12 December 2025 at Bangladesh Bhavana, Visva-Bharati, Santiniketan. The Roundtable brought together twenty-seven representatives from across twelve institutions in India, five media establishments, and five other departments of Visva-Bharati, including eminent academicians, media practitioners, and policy stakeholders. Deliberations focused on curriculum innovation, rural documentation, media capacity building, digital knowledge infrastructure and responsible development reporting, underscoring the importance of journalism that remains closely connected to communities and social realities. This collaboration reflects a shared commitment by CJMC, Visva-Bharati and UNICEF to nurturing development journalism anchored in social responsibility, inclusivity and democratic values. The initiative to launch the National Development Journalism Hub (NDJH) at Visva-Bharati emerges from these collective deliberations and aligns with the vision of NEP 2020 and Visva-Bharati’s ongoing efforts to strengthen industry–academia–community linkages, marking an important institutional step towards enhancing media literacy and democratic communication.