Raghu Rai (born in1942) started photography in 1965. He joined The Statesman newspaper as their chief photographer (1966 to 1976), and was then Picture Editor with Sunday—a weekly news magazine published from Calcutta (1977 to 1980).

Impressed by his show in Paris in 1971, Rai was nominated to Magnum Photos, the world’s most prestigious photographers’ cooperative, by the legendary photographer Henri Cartier Bresson

Rai took over as Picture Editor Visualiser-Photographer of India Today, India’s leading news magazine in its formative years. He worked on special issues and designs, contributing trailblazing picture essays on social, political and cultural themes of the decade (1982 to 1991), which became the talking point of the magazine.

Besides winning many national and international awards, Rai has exhibited his works in London, Paris, New York, Hamburg, and Prague, Bunkamura museum in Tokyo, Zurich and Sydney.

He was awarded the ‘Padmashree’ in 1971, one of India’s highest civilian awards ever given to a photographer. In 1992 he was awarded “Photographer of the Year” in the United States for the story “Human Management of Wildlife in India” published in National Geographic. His photo essays have appeared in many of the world’s leading and influential magazines and newspapers - including Time, Life, GEO, The New York Times, Sunday Times, Newsweek, The Independent and the New Yorker.

Thrice he has been on the jury of World Press Photo Contest and twice on Unesco’s International Photo Contest.

He has done extensive work on the photo documentation of the Bhopal Gas Tragedy and its continuing effects on the lives of gas victims under a special assignment from Greenpeace International. This documentation has been compiled into a book with three sets of exhibition traveling in Europe, America, India and South East Asia for the last two years, creating greater awareness about the tragedy and bringing relief to many survivors.

In the last eighteen years, Rai has specialized in extensive coverage of India, which is where he works primarily. He has produced more than 18 books including Raghu Rai’s Delhi (1992), The Sikhs (1984,2002), Calcutta (1989), Khajuraho (1991), Taj Mahal, (1986) Tibet in Exile (1991), India (1965) and Mother Teresa (1971, 1996, 2004).

Raghu Rai lives in New Delhi with his family and continues to be an associate of Magnum Photos.