When he first became a journalist trainee with the largest Indian English daily The Times of India way back in 1986, his first major assignment was in the news room to correct news stories and rewrite them in news format. He has since then reported from the world’s major hotspots, including Saudi Arabia, India, the UK, Italy, Greece, Belgium, the Netherlands, Nepal, Bahrain, Switzerland, Indonesia, South Korea, Singapore, Maldives, Turkey, Thailand, UAE, China, Somalia and Germany. Ghazanfar Ali Khan has had the distinction to become the first foreign journalist working in Saudi Arabia to travel with later King Abdullah Bin Abdulaziz to India in 2006 and then to Turkey in 2009. Ghazanfar Ali Khan has also interviewed most of the top world leaders over the past three decades, including US President Bill Clinton, British Prime Minister Tony Blair, South African President Nelson Mandela, Indian Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh and Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto. He is credited with interviewing about 500 prominent men and women including ministers, film actors, social activists and scientists.
Ghazanfar Ali Khan is currently the bureau chief of Arab News in Riyadh (Saudi Arabia). Born in Bihar (India), Ghazanfar Ali Khan was raised in a family of nine siblings. His father Abdul Hamid Khan was a police officer, whose services won high commendations from the British rule in pre-partitioned India. His mother Koraisha Khatoon belonged to an eminent old family of eastern India. Koraisha’s father Raj Mohammed Khan (Ghazanfar Ali Khan’s maternal grand father) was a military commander, who had the opportunity to lead an elite army in the World War II. Late Raj Mohammed Khan, whose World War II exploits are still remembered as folklore in eastern India and especially in his native Indian district of Siwas, was awarded about 60 acres of land, 5000 trees and high-tech weapons by the colonial British masters for his bravery in the war.
