Gitika Talukdar is an Assam-based sports photographer from Arunachal Pradesh who became the only Indian woman photojournalist accredited for the 2026 FIFA World Cup. Having previously covered the men’s tournaments in Russia and Qatar, the women’s World Cups in France and Australia–New Zealand, as well as the Olympics, ICC events, and Commonwealth Games, she has built one of the most extensive international football photography portfolios among Indian journalists while representing the Northeast on some of the world’s biggest sporting stages.
Gitika Talukdar was born in Arunachal Pradesh and grew up with a strong interest in sports and photography. Based in Assam, she built her career slowly through the difficult, travel-heavy world of sports photojournalism, where access to major tournaments takes years of work, credibility, and accreditation. She later studied Global Sports Management at Seoul National University in South Korea on a scholarship awarded by the country’s Ministry of Sports and Culture. In 2026, she became the only Indian woman photojournalist accredited to cover the FIFA World Cup.
Her FIFA journey has been long and consistent. The 2026 FIFA World Cup, hosted by the United States, Canada and Mexico, marks her third consecutive Men’s World Cup assignment after Russia 2018 and Qatar 2022. She has also covered the FIFA Women’s World Cup in France in 2019 and the Australia-New Zealand edition in 2023. This makes her one of the few Indian sports photojournalists with repeated access to football’s biggest global stages.
Over nearly two decades, Gitika has covered several major international sporting events. Her portfolio includes the Tokyo Olympics, the Paris Olympics, multiple ICC tournaments, the Commonwealth Games, and several FIFA assignments. Her work places her on the sidelines, close to the action, where sports history is often captured in fractions of a second: players reacting after a goal, crowds shifting with the match, athletes carrying pressure, joy, exhaustion, and defeat in their faces.
After receiving her 2026 FIFA accreditation, Gitika thanked FIFA, the All India Football Federation, and the Asian Football Confederation for their trust and support. Her achievement is especially notable because there are still very few women covering global football as sports photographers from India. For Assam and the Northeast, her presence at the World Cup means a great deal as well. It underlines that sports journalism in India is going further than it ever has. A woman photographer from the region working on one of the biggest sporting stages in the world might've seemed like a distant dream at the turn of the last century, but it's becoming more attainable than it ever has been.
Follow Gitika here.
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