Upendrakishore Ray Chowdhury | |
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Upendrokishore Ray
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Born |
Moshua, Kishoreganj District in Bengal (now Bangladesh) |
12 May 1863
Died | 20 December 1915 Giridih, Bihar, British India (now in Jharkhand, India) |
(aged 52)
Nationality | Bengali |
Other names |
Upendrokishore Raychowdhury, Kamadaranjan [original name] |
Known for | Writer, painter, violin player and composer, technologist and entrepreneur |
Children | Sukumar Ray, Sukhalata Rao, Subinoy Ray,Subimal Ray, Punyalata Chakrabarti and Shantilata. |
Upendrokishore Raychowdhury,
Upendrakishore Ray Chowdhury (Bengali: উপেন্দ্রকিশোর রায়চৌধুরী), also known as Upendrokishore Ray (উপেন্দ্রকিশোর রায়) (12 May 1863 – 20 December 1915) was a famous Bengali writer, painter, violin player and composer, technologist and entrepreneur.
He was the son-in-law of Dwarkanath Ganguly. He was the father of the famous writer Sukumar Ray and grandfather of the renowned filmmaker Satyajit Ray. Upendrakishore Ray Chowdhury was a product and leading member of the Brahmo Movement that spearheaded the cultural rejuvenation of Bengal. He collaborated with the Tagores whose family, in the arts, achieved world renown. As a writer he is best known for his collection of folklore; as a printer he pioneered in India in the art of engraving and was the first to attempt color printing at the time when engraving and color printing were also being pioneered in the West.
He was born on 12 May 1863 in a little village called Moshua in Mymensingh district of Bengal, (now Kishoreganj District in Bangladesh). He spent most of his adult life in Calcutta, where he died on 20 December 1915, aged only fifty-two.
Upendrakishore was born Kamadaranjan Ray, to Kalinath Ray, a scholar in Sanskrit, Arabic and Persian. He was expert in English and Persian languages and in the traditional Indian and British Indian legal systems. He became a topmost expert for interpreting old land deeds written in Persian and in helping the landowners to get the best deal from the newly introduced British legal system in India. He became affluent and in due course the family was able to afford two elephants.
At the age of five, Kamadaranjan was adopted by Harikishore, a relative who was a zamindar in Mymensingh (now in Bangladesh). Harikishore renamed his adopted son Upendrakishore, and added the honorific 'Raychaudhuri' as a surname.