Photographers mostly choose to keep a low profile which is an extension of their always being behind the camera with one eye fixed to the camera lens. Nemai Ghosh, the ever-present photographer of Satyajit Ray from 1968 when the director was making Goopy Gyne Bagha Byne till Ray passed away in 1992, was no different. He chose to keep a low profile but the minute he chose to open up with the story of his evolution from a theatre actor to one of the most celebrated photographers in India, Ghosh shed his shyness and begin to narrate the story of his life cheerfully over a cup of tea and biscuits. He was completely grounded and never carried airs despite his first-hand relationship with some of the greatest personalities of West Bengal, his Padma Shri bestowed on him in 2010, the numerous awards bestowed on him and his exhibitions held in India and beyond.

He passed away after a long illness during Covid in March 2020 so his only son Satyaki, a brilliant photographer in his own right, could not come to perform his last rites as flights were stopped and he was in Mumbai at the time.

His photographs on Ray are exhibited at the permanent gallery of St Xavier’s College, Kolkata, and at Nord Pas-de-Calais, France. Ghosh photographed great masters Jamini Roy, Ramkinker Baij and Benodebehari Mukherjee over the years 1969 and 1970. He went back to his interest in documenting master artists from 2002, photographing more than 30 major Indian painters and sculptors at work, resulting in a massive suite of photographs of the best minds in contemporary Indian art at work.

Over the years, he had taken more than one lakh negatives of photographs exclusively of Ray. This by itself is an astounding amount of work put in by a single man by any standards and speaks volumes or his hard work and dedication. Another work of Ghosh that will enter into posterity is his work for Bengali theatre which came out in the form of a book recording the history of Bengali Group Theatre for 25 years through photographs. After Ray passed away, Ghosh ventured to discover new worlds to capture them for posterity through the magic lens of his camera and this resulted in coffee table books of archival value that are still coming out one after another. Delhi Art Gallery (DAG) has digitized Ghosh's work of more than one lac negatives, and present around one hundred and seventy archival prints at the Harrington........

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