Raghu Rai, who chronicled India through his lens for over six decades and captured defining moments of its modern history, died at 83 in New Delhi early Sunday following a prolonged battle with cancer, his family said.
Born on December 18, 1942, in Jhang, Punjab (now in Pakistan), Raghu Rai passed away at a private hospital. He is survived by his wife Gurmeet, son Nitin, and daughters Lagan, Avani and Purvai.
“Dad was diagnosed with prostate cancer two years ago but he was cured. Then it spread to the stomach, that too was cured. Recently, the cancer spread to his brain and then there were age-related issues too,” his son Nitin Rai informed.
Trained as a civil engineer, Rai turned to photography at 23 and joined The Statesman as chief photographer in 1966. Over the next six decades, his work came to define Indian photojournalism, documenting the country’s socio-political transformation with rare intimacy.
A protégé of Henri Cartier-Bresson, Rai went on to join Magnum Photos in 1977. His lens captured some of the most significant events in India’s modern history, including the Bangladesh refugee crisis and the Bhopal gas tragedy.
His portraits of figures such as Indira Gandhi, the Dalai Lama, Mother Teresa, Satyajit Ray, Hariprasad Chaurasia and Bismillah Khan offered rare insights into their lives, even as he remained deeply committed to documenting everyday India.
In a 2023 interview with PTI, Rai reflected on his craft: “It's been more than 55 years but the most powerful part about photography is — life and nature are ever changing and ever challenging and that shakes you up.”
His iconic images include a haunting photograph from the Bhopal disaster of an infant in eternal stillness and a widely noted 1967 frame of Indira Gandhi surrounded by Congress leaders, capturing power and isolation in a single composition.
Photographer Aditya Arya said Rai transformed Indian photojournalism. “With his wide angle, he would be in the middle of the action… You can see in his photos how things change when you are in the middle of the action,” Arya said.
Photographer Samar Jodha recalled Rai’s focus on ordinary lives. “He had what in Hindi, in Urdu, in Punjabi we call ‘junoon’… Just that stubborn, burning need to be true,” he said.
Rai’s long association with publications such as Sunday and India Today, and his work in global titles including Time, Life, The New York Times and The New Yorker, cemented his international reputation. He also served on the jury of the World Press Photo and UNESCO’s International Photo Contest.
He was awarded the Padma Shri in 1972 for his coverage of the Bangladesh war and received France’s Officier des Arts et des Lettres in 2009. His books include “Raghu Rai's India” and “Exposure: Portrait Of A Corporate Crime”.
Tributes poured in across political and cultural circles. Rahul Gandhi said Rai preserved “our nation’s memory” and chronicled “the soul of India”. Shashi Tharoor described him as “the man with the gentle smile and the observant eye”. Naveen Patnaik said his frames were “living histories”, while Varun Grover called him “the silent storyteller”.
Rai’s last rites will be held at Lodhi Crematorium in New Delhi at 4 pm on Sunday.
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