Raghu Rai memorial set May 2
- Photographer Raghu Rai was cremated in New Delhi on April 26, and family and colleagues announced a public memorial for May 2 at 6 p.m. - The memorial is set for Chinmaya Mission Centre on Lodhi Road, after mourners gathered at Lodhi Cremation Ground with Rai’s wife and four children. - Rai, who died at 83, was Magnum Photos’ first Indian member and documented India across wars, politics and street life. (magnumphotos.com)
Raghu Rai was cremated in New Delhi on Sunday, and his family and colleagues set a public memorial for May 2 at 6 p.m. at the Chinmaya Mission Centre on Lodhi Road. (indianexpress.com) Mourners gathered at Lodhi Cremation Ground with Rai’s wife, Gurmeet Sangha Rai, and their four children, Nitin, Lagan, Purvai and Avani. A camera and a roll of Kodak Colorplus 200 film were placed beside him during his final journey. (indianexpress.com) Prime Minister Narendra Modi called Rai a “creative stalwart” in a condolence message on April 26, while Rahul Gandhi said his lens chronicled “the soul of India” for more than six decades. (pmindia.gov.in) (indianexpress.com) Rai died in Delhi on April 26 at 83, ending a career that stretched from the mid-1960s into 2026. His archive covered the Bangladesh war, the Emergency, Operation Blue Star and the Bhopal gas disaster. (indianexpress.com) (aljazeera.com) His pictures also fixed Delhi into the visual record of modern India, from Chandni Chowk and Shahjahanabad to portraits of Indira Gandhi, Mother Teresa and the Dalai Lama. A 2024 Kiran Nadar Museum of Art exhibition in New Delhi showed more than 250 black-and-white images from 1965 to 2005. (thehindu.com) (indianexpress.com) Rai began taking photographs in 1965 and joined The Statesman the next year as chief photographer. Henri Cartier-Bresson nominated him to Magnum Photos in 1977, making him the first Indian photographer to join the cooperative. (magnumphotos.com) He later worked at Sunday and then at India Today during the magazine’s formative years, shaping photojournalism in Indian newsrooms as well as on the street. (magnumphotos.com) (ndtv.com) The crowds at his cremation reflected that reach: Aroon Purie, Shekhar Gupta, Nandita Das, Naresh Trehan, Bharti Kher, Subodh Gupta and several photojournalists were there in person. (indianexpress.com) The next public farewell is now set for Friday evening in Delhi, in a city Rai spent decades photographing frame by frame. (indianexpress.com)
