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List of notable people from Kolkata. The city of Kolkata has been regarded as the cultural capital of India.[1]
Writers, Including poets
- S Wajid Ali
- Syed Mujtaba Ali
- Sharadindu Bandyopadhyay
- Kumudini Basu
- Suchitra Bhattacharya
- Sukanta Bhattacharya
- Buddhadev Bose
- Amiya Chakravarty
- Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay
- Shakti Chattopadhyay
- Nirad C. Chaudhuri
- Pramatha Chowdhury
- Upendrakishore Ray Chowdhury
- Dinesh Das
- Jibanananda Das
- Henry Louis Vivian Derozio
- Bishnu Dey
- Michael Madhusudan Dutta
- Satyendranath Dutta
- Sudhindranath Dutta
- Sunil Gangopadhyay
- Joy Goswami
- Gulzar
- Asit Kumar Haldar
- Amelia Horne
- Kazi Nazrul Islam
- Sisir Kumar Maitra
- Binoy Majumdar
- Mohitolal Majumdar
- Samaresh Majumdar (b.1944)
- Arun Mitra
- Dinabandhu Mitra
- Premendra Mitra
- Mimi Mondal, First Indian English writer who nominated for Hugo Award.
- Dhan Gopal Mukerji
- Shobhanasundari Mukhopadhyay, Shovana Devi Tagore, folklorist
- Subhas Mukhopadhyay
- Purnendu Patri
- Christopher Raja
- Annada Shankar Ray
- Dwijendralal Ray
- Sukumar Ray
- Tarapada Ray
- Samar Sen
- Badal Sircar, dramatist and theatre director
- Srijato
- Rabindranath Tagore, 1st non-European to win a Nobel Prize
Philosophers and religious teachers
The most famous religious figure of Kolkata is Mother Teresa. Others are (in order of surname):
- Bhakti Hridaya Bon (1901–1982)
- Bhakti Prajnana Kesava Goswami (1898–1968)
- Boro Maa, (1918–2019)
- A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada (1896–1977), founder of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON)
- Ramakrishna (1836–1886)
- Ram Mohan Roy (1772–1833)
- Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati (1874–1837), founder of Gaudiya Math
- Keshab Chandra Sen (1838–1884)
- Debendranath Tagore (1817–1905)
- Bhaktivinoda Thakur (1838–1914)
- Swami Vivekananda (1863–1902)
- Paramhansa Yogananda (1893-1952)
Engineers and scientists
- James Atkinson (1780–1852), surgeon, artist and Persian scholar
- Sanghamitra Bandyopadhyay (born 1968), computer scientist
- R. D. Banerji, archeologist
- Sir Jagadish Chandra Bose (1858–1937), Bengali polymath, physicist, biologist, biophysicist, botanist and archaeologist
- Upendranath Brahmachari
- Bikas K Chakrabarti (born 1952), theoretical physicist and econophysicist
- Asima Chatterjee (1917–2006), chemist
- Debendra Mohan Bose (1875–1975), physicist
- Satyendra Nath Bose (1894–1974), physicist and polymath from Bengal
- Suniti Kumar Chattopadhyay (1890–1977), Bengali linguist
- Barun De (1932–2013), historian
- Brajendranath De (1852–1932), civil servant and orientalist
- Anil Kumar Gain (1919–1978), mathematician and statistician
- J.B.S. Haldane (1892–1964), British-Indian scientist, known for his work in the study of physiology, genetics, evolutionary biology, and mathematics
- Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis (1893–1972), Bengali scientist and applied statistician
- R.C. Majumdar (1884–1980), historian
- P. J. Marshall (born 1933), historian
- Ujjwal Maulik (born 1965), computer scientist
- Subhash Mukhopadhyay (1931–1981), physician
- Sisir Kumar Mitra (1890–1963), physicist
- Shehla Pervin, Indian scientist and scholar
- Rajat Kanta Ray, historian
- Amal Kumar Raychaudhuri (1922–2005), physicist, known for his research in general relativity and cosmology
- Tapan Raychaudhuri (1926–2014), historian
- Tapati Guha-Thakurta (born 1957), historian
- Sukanta Chaudhuri (born 1950), literary scholar
- Ananda Lal (born 1955), academic and theatre scholar
- C. R. Rao (1920–2023), mathematician and statistician
- Prafulla Chandra Roy (1861–1944), Bengali chemist, educationist, historian, industrialist and philanthropist
- Meghnad Saha (1893–1956), astrophysicist
- Sir Jadunath Sarkar (1870–1958), historian
- Sumit Sarkar (born 1939), historian
- Susobhan Sarkar (1900–1982), historian
- Tapan Kumar Sarkar (1948–2021), electrical engineer
- Ashoke Sen (born 1956), theoretical physicist
- Sukumar Sen, historian of Bengali literature
Gallantry Awards winners
- Flight Lieutenant Suhas Biswas
- Squadron Leader Madhavendra Banerji
Bankers and business people
- Radhe Shyam Agarwal
- Amar Kumar Bera
- P. C. Bhattacharya, 7th Governor, Reserve Bank of India
- Aditya Vikram Birla
- Radhe Shyam Goenka
- R. P. Goenka (RPG Group)
- Sanjiv Goenka
- Chandra Shekhar Ghosh (founder of Bandhan Bank)
- Rajat Gupta (b. 1948)
- Ellis Jacob (founder of Cineplex Entertainment)
- Lakshmi Mittal
- Tiny Rowland (chairman of Lonrho from 1962 to 1993)
- Prannoy Roy (b.1949)
- Nalini Ranjan Sarkar
- Mutty Lall Seal
Freedom fighters
- Sri Aurobindo
- Maulana Azad
- Benoy Basu
- Khudiram Bose
- Rash Behari Bose
- Subhas Chandra Bose
- Jogesh Chandra Chatterjee
- Chittaranjan Das
- Jatindra Nath Das
- Sisir Kumar Ghosh
- Badal Gupta
- Dinesh Gupta
- Basanti Devi Haldar
- Matangini Hazra
- Bagha Jatin
- Bipin Chandra Pal
- Sudhamoy Pramanick
- Bidhan Chandra Roy
- Ashoke Kumar Sen
Performing arts
Artists
- Sukanta Basu
- Jogen Chowdhury
- Anil Kumar Dutta
- Gerry Judah
- Shanu Lahiri[2]
- William Laidlay
- Paresh Maity
- Ganesh Pyne
- Devajyoti Ray
- Jamini Roy
- Sudip Roy
- Samir Roychoudhury
- Paritosh Sen
Directors
- Nitin Bose
- Aniruddha Roy Chowdhury
- Buddhadeb Dasgupta
- Anik Dutta
- Kaushik Ganguly
- Ritwik Ghatak
- Gautam Ghose
- Rituparno Ghosh
- Sujoy Ghosh
- Atiul Islam
- Farha Khatun
- Tarun Majumdar
- Hrishikesh Mukherjee
- Kamaleshwar Mukherjee
- Shiboprosad Mukherjee
- Srijit Mukherji
- Satyajit Ray, winner of Oscar for Lifetime Achievement in 1992 and considered among the greatest director of film history.
- Bimal Roy
- Shakti Samanta
- Aparna Sen
- Avijit Sen
- Mrinal Sen
- Tapan Sinha
Cinema actors
- Pt. Debshankar Haldar, actor
- Nabadwip Haldar, actor and comedian
- Goutam Halder, actor and director
- Uttam Kumar, actor, singer, composer, producer, director and screenwriter
- Kaushik Ganguly, actor, director and screenwriter
- Koushik Sen, actor and TV personality
- Mithun Chakraborty, actor, dancer and TV personality
- Rabi Ghosh, actor and comedian
- Ranjit Mallick, actor
- Dhritiman Chaterji, actor
- Tapen Chatterjee, actor
- Barun Chanda
- Pahari Sanyal
- N. Viswanathan
- Chhabi Biswas
- Karuna Bannerjee
- Koel Mallick, actress and daughter of Ranjit Mallick
- Anil Chatterjee
- Arpita Chatterjee, actress and TV personality; wife of Prosenjit Chatterjee
- Subir Banerjee
- Roopa Ganguly
- Uma Dasgupta
- Saswata Chatterjee
- Tarun Kumar
- Anup Kumar
- Ashok Kumar
- Bhanu Bandopadhyay
- Biswajit Chatterjee, actor, producer, director and politician
- Prosenjit Chatterjee, actor, producer and TV personality; son of Biswajit Chatterjee
- Debashree Roy, actress, dancer, choreographer, animal rights activist and politician; ex-wife of Prosenjit Chatterjee
- Jahor Roy
- Kanan Devi
- Sagarika Mukherjee
- Swastika Mukherjee
- Razzak
- Dev, actor, singer, producer, screenwriter and politician
- Jeet, actor, producer and TV personality
- Ruma Guha Thakurta
- Tapas Paul
- Mahua Roy Choudhury
- Mirza Abbas Ali
- Suchitra Sen
- Antara Biswas, actress
- Aparna Sen, actress, filmmaker and scriptwriter
- Moonmoon Sen
- Riddhi Sen, actor
- Riya Sen, actress
- Raima Sen, actress
- Reema Sen, actress
- Rituparna Sengupta, actress
- Omar Sani
- Victor Banerjee, actor
- Moushumi Chatterjee
- Parambrata Chatterjee
- Konkona Sen Sharma, actress and filmmaker
- Varsha Ashwathi
- Abhishek Chatterjee
- Tathagata Mukherjee
- Monali Thakur, singer and actress
- Yash Dasgupta, actor, producer and TV personality
- Bonny Sengupta, actor and politician
- Nusrat Jahan, actress, politician and former Miss Kolkata 2010; wife of Yash Dasgupta
- Mimi Chakraborty, actress, producer and politician
- Anirban Bhattacharya
- Sayani Gupta, actress
- Sayantani Ghosh, actress and TV personality
- Sayak Chakraborty
- Sulakshana Pandit, singer and actress
- Vijayta Pandit, singer and actress
Theatre figures
- Rudraprasad Sengupta, actor and director
- Sambhu Mitra, actor and director
- Girishchandra Ghosh father of Bengali theatre
- Chitra Sen
- Koushik Sen
Photographers
Composers
- Jeet Ganguly
- Kabir Suman
- Salil Chowdhury
- Rahul Dev Burman
- Shashi Preetam
- Sachin Dev Burman
- Bappi Lahiri
- Shantanu Moitra
- Pritam
- Hemanta Mukhopadhyay
- Rupam Islam
- Nachiketa Ghosh
- Sudhin Dasgupta
- Anupam Roy
- Anjan Dutt
- Jaimin Rajani
- Pankaj Mullick
- Anil Biswas
- Nachiketa Ghosh
- Shyamal Mitra
Hindustani classical singers/maestros
- Ustad Allauddin Khan
- Ustad Ali Akbar Khan
- Pandit Ravi Shankar
- Ananda Shankar
- Ustad Vilayat Khan
- Pandit Jasraj
- Ustad Bade Ghulam Ali Khan
- Pandit Bhimsen Joshi
- Rashid Khan
- Naina Devi[3]
- Pandit Nikhil Banerjee
- Ustad Amjad Ali Khan
- Ustad Bahadur Khan
- Pandit Ajoy Chakraborty
- Kaushiki Chakraborty
Hindustani classical instrumentalists
Other singers
- Dwijendra Lal Roy
- Suprakash Chaki
- K. C. Dey
- Gauhar Jan
- Pankaj Mullick
- Kanan Devi
- Kanika Bandyopadhyay
- Suchitra Mitra
- Hemanta Kumar Mukhopadhyay
- Manabendra Mukhopadhyay
- Manna Dey
- Kishore Kumar
- Sandhya Mukhopadhyay
- Geeta Dutt
- Debabrata Biswas
- Begum Akhtar
- Usha Uthup
- Indrani Sen
- Ruma Guha Thakurta
- Swagatalakshmi Dasgupta
- Srikanta Acharya
- Anwesshaa
- Suman Chatterjee
- Sachin Dev Burman
- Anjan Dutt
- Rupam Islam
- Prashant Tamang
- Shayan Chowdhury Arnob
Contemporary Bollywood musicians
- Abhijeet Bhattacharya, playback singer
- Anupam Roy (b.1982), singer-songwriter
- Alka Yagnik (b. 1966), playback singer
- Arijit Singh (b. 1987), singer, music producer, recordist and music programmer
- Babul Supriyo (b. 1970), playback singer, live performer, television host, actor and politician
- Kumar Sanu (b. 1957), playback singer
- Pritam (b. 1971)
- Sagarika (b. 1970), playback singer and actress
- Shreya Ghoshal (b. 1984), playback singer
- Shaan (b. 1972), playback singer and actor
Dancers
Prominent dancers of the city include:
- Uday Shankar and his wife Amala Shankar
- Mamata Shankar
- Tanushree Shankar
- Ananda Shankar
- Sadhana Bose
- Sharmila Biswas[4]
- Shila Mehta, classical dance artist, choreographer, teacher, and composer
- Rani Karnaa
- Rajeswari Vaidyanathan, Tedx Speaker, trainer, performer and choreographer
Magicians
Kolkata is the magic capital of India and has produced internationally famous magicians and performers, including:
Sports
Nobel laureates
Six Nobel Prize winners have been associated with Kolkata:
- Sir Ronald Ross (1857–1932) – Medicine, 1902
- Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) – Literature, 1913; first Asian to win the Nobel Prize
- Mother Teresa (1910–1997) – Peace, 1979
- Amartya Sen (born 1933) – Economics, 1998
- Abhijit Vinayak Banerjee (born 1961) – Economics, 2019
- CV Raman – Physics
Ramon Magsaysay Award winners
The Ramon Magsaysay Award, sometimes called "Asia's Nobel Prize", is given "to perpetuate his example of integrity in government, courageous service to the people, and pragmatic idealism within a democratic society." Kolkata winners include:
- Mother Teresa (1910–1997) – Peace and International Understanding, 1962
- Satyajit Ray (1921–1992) – Journalism, Literature, and the Creative Communication Arts, 1967
- Gour Kishore Ghosh (1923–2000) – Journalism, Literature, and the Creative Communication Arts, 1981
- Mahasweta Devi (1926–2016) – Journalism, Literature, and the Creative Communication Arts, 1997
Others
- Samik Bandyopadhyay (born 1940), critic of Indian art, theatre and film
- Tanmoy Bhattacharya (born 1958), politician
- William Carey (1761–1834), missioner and reformer
- Laksmikanta Roy Choudhury (1570–1649), Brahmin scholar, social and political figure
- Alexander Duff (1806—1878), missioner and reformer
- Manny Elias (born 1953), drummer, record producer; original drummer of the Tears for Fears
- David Hare (1775–1842), philanthropist and founder of many important and prestigious educational institutions of Kolkata
- Rajendra Prasad (1884–1963), politician, the first president of India (from 1950 to 1962)
- Romita Ray (born 1970), art historian
- Radhika Roy (born 1948), journalist
- Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak (born 1942), scholar, literary theorist, and feminist critic
- Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar (1820–1891), philosopher, academic, writer, translator, entrepreneur, social reformer and philanthropist; key figure of the Bengal Renaissance
References
- ↑ Calcutta: a cultural and literary history{{#if:naiya|, naiya}. Signal Books(2003). ISBN 978-1-902669-59-5
- ↑ Shanu Lahiri dead. The Telegraph (Calcutta). Retrieved 15 March 2013.
- ↑ A Tale Of Two Women: In search of their own songs. The Telegraph(11 March 2012). Retrieved 6 June 2013.
- ↑ Katha Kavya Abhinaya. Sangeet Natak Akademi(2011). Retrieved 28 May 2013.