Mrinal initially studied to be an engineer and worked in the oilfields of Egypt, UAE and Kuwait observing the years of reconstruction after the Gulf War. Soon after, he went on to study Motion Picture Photography at the Film & Television Institute of India.

His career as a cinematographer has now spanned over two decades and has taken him across the globe filming with directors & producers on various projects. He has worked on feature length documentaries that have taken years to complete, television documentaries with strict broadcast deadlines, TV & web series with leading personalities, award winning feature films as well as high end branded content and TV commercials. This wide range of experience across cultures, working styles and technologies stands him in good stead while working on any project.

Mrinal’s documentary credits include the Oscar nominated ‘To Kill a Tiger’, ‘The World Before Her’ ( Primetime Emmy nominated, Tribeca and HotDocs winner, 2012), both directed by Nisha Pahuja. He also filmed the BAFTA winner (2010) & Emmy nominated, ‘Terror in Mumbai’ & ‘The Battle for Haiti’ (BAFTA winner 2011) both directed by Dan Reed. Other films with Reed include ‘Terror at the Mall’ (BAFTA nomination 2015), ‘The Ground Zero Mosque’ (Channel 4/PBS) and ‘Children of the Tsunami’ (BBC/SWR).

His other documentary credits include ‘In Search of Gandhi’ directed by Lalit Vachani, one of the 10 films made for the ‘Why Democracy?’ series which was broadcast in October 2007 by over 40 broadcasters worldwide, Anjali Panjabi’s ‘A Few Things I Know About Her’ & Arun Khopkar’s ‘Narayan Ganagaram Surve’ both of which won Golden Lotuses at the 2002 Indian National Film Awards.

More recently he worked on some of the episodes of the Christiane Amanpour series for Netflix : Sex & Love around the World and the Marcus Samuelsson series for PBS : No Passport Required.

Mrinal’s last feature film, ‘The Burdened’ was filmed on location in Aden and premieres at Berlin in 2023. Mrinal also filmed ‘Court’ which was an astounding critical success winning 19 awards internationally including 2 Lions at the 2014 Venice International Film Festival and Golden Lotus for Best Feature Film at the 2015 National Awards. He was second unit Cinematographer on Danny Boyle’s 2009 multi Oscar winning ‘Slumdog Millionaire’. His other feature films include Amit Dutta’s ‘Nainsukh’ for the Reitberg Museum in Zurich and Pryas Gupta’s ‘Siddharth’ (Grand Jury Prize, Asia Pacific Screen Awards, 2008).

When not filming Mrinal spends his time with family and friends as well as sitting and serving on Vipassana courses. Initially based in Mumbai for many years and then New York, he is now settled in Toronto.