He is the son of Purushottama Lal, founder of Writers Workshop, one of India's oldest creative writing publishers, established in 1958.

[1][2][3] He is a former Professor of English and Coordinator, Rabindranath Tagore Studies Centre (UGC), at Jadavpur University, Calcutta and has now retired from active service.

[4] He currently heads Writers Workshop, translates from Bengali to English, is a theatre critic for The Times of India (Calcutta).

Lal has directed thirty theatre productions, many of them for Jadavpur University where he taught Drama in Practice, an optional course for students of the Department of English, and worked in another twenty productions, including such internationally acclaimed successes as Tim Supple's "Midsummer Night's Dream".

He has a 30-year portfolio in television and film as an scriptwriter, researcher, commentator, narrator and subtitler, and has been interviewed by BBC, Radio Nederland and UGC-Doordarshan.