Satyajit Ray, a contemporary of Ritwik Ghatak, and Mrinal Sen, was born in kolkata (Calcutta) on 2^nd of May 1921. He initially studied at Calcutta University and later shifted to Shantiniketan to study art. He founded Calcutta's first film society in 1947.  He made his first film ‘Pather Panchali’in the year 1955 soon followed by ‘Aparajito’ and ‘Apur Sansar’ together known as 'Apu Trilogy'. ‘Pather Panchali’ was an immediate success and for this he won the Grand Prix at the Cannes film festival. His other films are Charulata, Mahanagar, Ghare-Baire, Ashani Shanket, Ganshatru, Agantuk, Jalshaghar, Kanchenjunga        

He not only directed his films but also wrote screenplays of all his films, operated the camera and composed music for most of the films and many of his films are based on his own stories. Satyajit Ray was a talented littérateur as well. In the year 1961, he revived the children’s magazine ‘Sandesh’ which was founded by his grand father Upendrakishore Roychoudhuri. He wrote many short stories and novels as well and is specially known for his fictional series on Detective Feluda and Scientist Professor Shonku.

Ray in course of his long career had received many international awards and honours including Palm’de or for Best Human documentary, the Oscar for lifetime achievements and the Legion d’onors from the French government.

He died in the year 1992 on 23^rd of April at Kolkata.

Ray's most famous film Pather Panchali was based on Bibhuti Bhushan Bannerjee's novel of the same name. But while the novel showed a grim reality of Bengal's famine days, Ray's work shows the survival of hope and love in the midst of all that was sad. This is a recurring feature of most of Ray's works.