Animals

Raghu Rai was one of India's most influential and legendary photojournalists. Between 1966 and 1976, he was chief photographer at The Statesman and was then Picture Editor, from 1977 to 1980, with Sunday―a weekly news magazine published from Kolkata. After completing a Thomson fellowship in England, he also worked with The Times in London. 

Rai was awarded the Padma Shri in 1972, the first to a photographer for the body of works he produced on Bangladesh refugees and the war. 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. In 2009, he was conferred with the Officer des Arts et des Letters honour by the French Government. In 2016, we received a lifetime achievement award at the National Photography Awards in India. In 2018, he was celebrated by the Lucie Foundation in New York, as Master of Photojournalism.

In 2019, Rai became the first laureate photographer of Académie Des Beaux Art in Paris―one of the highest awards in photography ever given to a living photographer.

Maneka Gandhi is the former Union Cabinet Minister for Women and Child Development, a renowned animal rights activist and environmentalist, and the chairperson of People for Animals which is India's largest animal welfare organization.