Sunil Janah, a pioneering photojournalist, died on June 21, 2012, at his home in Berkeley, California.  He was 94 years old.  Mr. Janah was one of the first photojournalists and social documentors  of India.

Recently he received the Padma Bhushan, a civilian award given by the Government of India. This was presented to him at his home, a few weeks ago, by the Indian Consulate in San Francisco.  Absent at the award ceremony was his wife, Dr. Sobha Janah, nee Dutt.  Sadly, she passed away on May 18, 2012.  She was his caretaker, pillar of strength and cheer leader, who worked tirelessly behind the scenes to help preserve and document his vast library of photographs.

Before digital cameras, Flickr and Instagram, there was Mr. Janah, a visual chronicler par excellence, with his obsession to capture India on film — “from Kashmir to Kanya Kumari” and, as it turned out, through many tumultuous decades.  His photostream would have been a source of envy in today’s digital world.  His vast repertoire of carefully composed photographs offer a stunning and unforgettable visual  journey through India from the 1930s to the 1990s.

“He visually documented the ethnography of the country in a way that nobody had really done before.  He went from one remote corner of the country to another.” says Arjun Janah, his son. “He documented the passage of the country through its most turbulent phase — from the 1930s to the 1950s,  recording tragic events such as the Bengal famine of 1943-44 and the 1947 Partition of India, with its riots and refugees.  He created a visual history of the peasant, labor and independence movements.  His political/historical work extended right up to the Bangladesh war of 1971.  His photographs of the diverse tribal peoples of India are a vital anthropological and historical record.  And then there are his photographs of political leaders — from Mohandas Gandhi to Indira and beyond — and of cultural figures –  scientists, writers, painters, dancers and many others,” he adds.  He was also active, especially through the 1950′s and 1960′s, in photographing India’s new industrialization as well its ancient architecture.

Mr. Janah started his career in photography during the British Raj in India and continued taking pictures till he was well into his 80’s. His skill as a photographer was recognized early on in his career, especially by some of the world’s famous photographers. In the 1940s, the well-known American photographer, Margaret Bourke-White of Life magazine, who had seen his photographs of the Bengal famine, came in search of him and asked for his help . He traveled with Bourke-White to South India  to document the famine that had spread to that region.  The story goes that as Bourke-White shot her subjects, Mr. Janah photographed them from a different angle, often utilizing the light from her flash. If  Bourke-White helped create modern photojournalism in the US, Mr. Janah did the same for India.  In rememberance of their  friendship an autographed black and white photograph of her hung over the mantle piece in his living room not far from the pictures of his mother and of his late daughter.

“Unforgettable,” is how Arjun describes his father’s photographs. “For over six decades, my father was an active photographer, starting from the 1930s and continuing through to the early 1990s. He continued to work in the dark room till he was in his mid-80s. He started with a simple Kodak Box Brownie camera and then went on to take some of his most memorable pictures using a Rolleiflex  and later a Leica.  Much later on, in the 1980s and 1990′s, he used a Nikon camera,” says Arjun.

Had he not lost his eyesight, Mr. Janah would have continued to take pictures as he pointed out in an interview I did with him a few years ago – perhaps the last interview Mr. Janah ever did because of his failing health and eye-sight. Failing health, however, did not diminish his passion. In fact, he spent the last decade of his life writing and organizing the text and pictures for a comprehensive book of his about to be published by Oxford University Press (OUP).

Mr. Janah’s photographs have been used (with and without attribution or compensation) in countless articles and books.  He has, however, authored three books  and co-authored one. “His first book,  The Second Creature, published by Signet Press, Calcutta, 1948, was designed by Satyajit Ray,” says Arjun. “He co-authored his second book, Dances of the Golden Hall, with Ashoke Chatterjee.  My father took the pictures, of the dancer Shanta Rao, but the text was written by Mr. Chatterjee, who was also the force behind its inception and publication. His third book, The Tribals of India, was firs tpublished in 1993, by OUP India.  A second, revised edition appeared in 2003.  His final  book. about to be published.  is titled Photographing India.  This book, which is also from OUP (India), is autobiographical and historical in nature. It includes photographs taken  from the 1930s to the 1990s.  The last chapter presents his thoughts about living in the U.S.A., post 9/11.”

Mr. Janah was born on April 17, 1918 in Dibrugarh, Assam to Sarat Chandra Janah and Pramila Bala Roy-Janah.  His father was a brilliant student of chemistry who later became a well-known advocate in the Calcutta High Court.  His fascination with cameras and photography started as a young boy and continued for the next eighty years. Although he was not formally trained he learned to perfect his art and technique by working with different people in their dark rooms. One such person, as his son Arjun points out, was the well-known Calcutta photographer Shambhu Saha.

He joined the Communist Party of India in pre-independent India. “My father’s mentor was PC Joshi,” says Arjun.  Mr.Joshi was the first secretary general of the Communist Party of India. “When Joshi was forced out of the party in 1947,  my father was  forced out as well along with many others.  He never went back to the Communist Party,” says Arjun.  Although he left the Communist Party in India, Mr. Janah “believed till his dying day in the goals and ideals of socialism,” adds Arjun.

There was something about the quality of his photographs that spoke to everybody, whether it was famous photographers like Bourke-White and Henri Cartier-Bresson or ordinary folk.  “Many of his pictures were tightly composed, much like a pithy poem.  They had a quality that caught your eye,” says Arjun.

Mr. Janah book-ended his life with the aptly titled book, Photographing India, which is a fitting epitaph to his life and work. With him at the end in Berkeley was Dr. Brian Watson, the Janahs’ long-term friend from their two decades together in London. Dr. Watson made frequent trips from the UK to visit the Janah’s in the  US. and in flew in to be with  Dr. Sobha Janah when she passed away on May 18, 2012.  He remained faithfully by  Mr. Janah’s side to the very end, till his passing away on June 21, 2012.

Related Links:
Audio Interview with Sunil Janah Part-1 and Part-2.

YouTube interview with Sunil Janah.

Note added: Reviews, background information, lists of publications and exhibitions and two virtual exhibitions of Mr. Janah’s work may be seen at the website,http://suniljanah.org, that was created for him, over the years, by his sole surviving offspring, Arjun.

Sunil Janah’s photos used in the YouTube video is used with permission from Sunil Janah’s family.