Vicky Roy has traversed an amazing journey from a rag-picker to a famous and acclaimed photographer at the age of 32.

Vicky Roy is an internationally acclaimed Documentary Photographer. He calls himself a documentary photographer as he works on long term photography projects. Currently he is working on an initiative called ‘Everyone is Good at Something’. Under this project he has been travelling to all the states and UTs of India and shooting disability stories in all the stories and posting them on his website.

Vicky’s father was a tailor master in Purulia in West Bengal and earned very little. So his parents left him for upbringing with his maternal grandparents who were financially stable. As he had heard and seen in films that people went to big cities to earn big and to make their lives, he too one day stole some money from his maternal uncle and ran away to Delhi. He came into the company of some rag-picker boys and started collecting empty water bottles, refilling them with cold water from the water coolers and selling them in the trains. Soon he realised that surviving on a railway platform was difficult and took a job as a dishwasher in  a nearby dhaba.

One day a volunteer from the NGO Salaam Baalak Trust chanced upon him and took him to the trust where he was given shelter. He started living in Apna Ghar-their shelter home, and also started going to school in the sixth class. Salaam Baalak is an NGO which gives shelter to street children and orphans and provides them all facilities like living quarters, three time meals, school uniforms and books etc, and even takes them on vacations every year to hill stations. He was happy there. He is still in regular touch with Salaam Baalak Trust and its inmates. He is also the Vice President of the Salaam Baalak Alumni Association and helps the boys and girls living there in finding jobs and by all other means.

When, after four years, he scored less marks in the 10th standard, his mentor in the shelter home advised him to leave studies and go for some vocational training like cooking, tailoring etc. But, he expressed his interest in photography. They helped him and he started doing photography in 2005. He took a job as an assistant to a big photographer in Delhi and started learning the tricks of the profession.

By the stroke of good luck he found sponsors in the British High Commission and the DFIB, who sponsored his first exhibition ‘Street Diaries’ which was held at the India Habitat Center in New Delhi. The exhibition was a great success and it travelled to countries like South Africa and Vietnam and also to London three times.

In 2008, he won an international competition and was selected among four photographers from all over the world for a six months trip to New York. There he was involved in the photo shoot of the rebuilding of the World Trade Centre. They also got him admitted to the International Centre of Photography for a six months course.

When he came back from New York in 2009, he won an Award Program of the Trust and was invited to London for a private lunch with Prince Edward in Buckingham Palace. In 2011, he set up a Library of Books on Photography at New Delhi’s Sri Aurobindo Center for Art with the help of books donated by celebrated photographers. He also organised talks of famous photographers at the library.

In 2013 he was selected for a reality show by National Geographic Channel and went to Sri Lanka for the competition. He survived up to the ninth episode of the show and was among the top four. In the same year his first book, ‘Home Street Home’ was published. He also got a fellowship and was invited to Boston and MIT. He was also invited for motivational lectures to the Pentagon, Harvard University, the White House, the World bank, and to the headquarters of Facebook and Google. In 2016, he was included by Forbes Asia in their ‘30 under 30’ feature.

Vicky thinks that the turning points in his life were when he was able to have an exhibition at such a young age and also when his mentor in Salaam Baalak Trust pulled his legs when he started becoming arrogant and flying high thus encouraging him to have his feet on the ground and to be focused on his photography.

Talking about Covid times, he says as he has developed a habit of constant travelling, it was very difficult for him to be stuck at one place. He learnt cooking new dishes, dug into his photo archives and also helped some NGOs by doing free of charge photo shoots for them.

Vicky thinks that digitalisation is not a threat to traditional photography and in the coming years there will be good scope for the profession. He says earlier only top hotels and business houses went for product shoots but today businesses at all levels go for it. Thus the market for photography is growing. Even in weddings you can see five-six photographers now as compared to only two about fifteen years ago. He says newcomers must have patience before they taste success. Just as engineering or other professions take five-six years before you get settled, photography also takes the same time.

Vicky says his mentor Sanjay Roy, a trustee in Salaam Baalak Trust and Ms Nair have been the biggest inspirations in his life.

As he gets most of his work through NGOs he too supports them through his photography sometimes. Many times he helps NGOs raise money by auctioning his selected photos and donating the money raised for some noble cause.

In his free time he likes to travel. He goes to see museums and observes the art displayed there. He also revisits his shoots.

Vicky’s message is that there is no shortcut to success in life. He advises going on working and whatever is destined for you will come to you but only in due course of time and not sooner.