Salam graduated in photography from Pathshala the South Asian institute of photography and media academy. He has studied a post Graduation Diploma in Visual Journalism through a scholarship program of World Press Photo at the Konrad Adenauer Asian Center for Journalism (ACFJ) at Ateneo de Manila University in the Philippines. He has been teaching, mentoring photography in workshops and seminars for aspiring young photographers regularly and has also been on the jury boards of numerous photography contests in Bangladesh. Social photo-documentary, portraits are among his interests. He started his photographic career with DrikNEWS agency. He worked for New Age an English daily of Bangladesh, Drik picture agency, Majority world, ZUMA press, Nur photo agency, and Corbis images.