Gautam Chintamani is a film historian and the author of Rajneeti (Penguin-Random House, 2019), the first biography of Rajnath Singh. He is the author of the bestselling Dark Star: The Loneliness of Being Rajesh Khanna (HarperCollins,

2014), The Film That Revived Hindi Cinema (HarperCollins, 2016) and Pink- The Inside Story (HarperCollins, 2017). His upcoming book The Midway Battle: Narendra Modi's Roller-coaster Second Term (Bloomsbury) will release in 2021.

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He hails from a literary tradition that runs deep on both sides of his family—the late Telugu poet Arudra is his maternal grandfather and the liberal thinker Sir C.Y. Chintamani is his paternal great-grandfather.

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Gautam's writing has featured in national publications, including a compilation on Dadasaheb Phalke awardees published by the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, Legends of Indian Silver Screen. He was on the National Film Awards jury for Best Writing on Cinema in 2016. The British Film Institute included The Film That Revived Hindi Cinema in their library in 2016. In 2017, Gautam contributed an essay on the cinema of Franz Osten for The British Film Institute’s restoration project of filmmaker’s 1928 masterpiece Shiraz.

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Gautam’s documentary film SRI: Challenging Traditions, Transforming Lives won the Best Documentary Award at the Asia Pacific Rice Film Festival, Malaysia. His trilogy, Janam–Aagazh–Parvaaz, on the journey of children with special needs and their parents was screened at the 2011 International Film Festival of India (IFFI). His notable television credits include Siddhanth, a law series that garnered an Emmy nomination in the ‘international drama’ category—a first for an Indian television show.

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He and his wife, Amrita, along with their dog, Buddy, live in Gurgaon and in the hills of Himachal.