This is a list of notable people from West Bengal, India. This list does not include the significant number of prominent East Bengali refugees from East Bengal who settled in West Bengal after the partition of the Indian sub-continent in 1947.
Literature
Major figures
Bibhutibhushan Bandyopadhyay Manik Bandopadhyay Sharadindu Bandyopadhyay Tarasankar Bandyopadhyay Rajshekhar Basu Suchitra Bhattacharya Shibram Chakraborty Amiya Chakravarty Bankim Chandra Chatterjee Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay Pramatha Chaudhuri Ashapurna Devi Mahasweta Devi Michael Madhusudan Dutt Sudhindranath Dutta Joy Goswami Kazi Nazrul Islam Samaresh Majumdar Premendra Mitra Mimi Mondal Ashutosh Mukhopadhyay Shirshendu Mukhopadhyay Annada Shankar Ray Satyajit Ray Narayan Sanyal Syed Mustafa Siraj Rabindranath Tagore
Children's story writers
Sasthipada Chattopadhyay Shibram Chakraborty Upendrakishore Ray Chowdhury Anish Deb Narayan Debnath Narayan Gangopadhyay Sunil Gangopadhyay Leela Majumdar Samaresh Majumdar Premendra Mitra Shirshendu Mukhopadhyay Sourav Mukhopadhyay Moti Nandi Sukumar Ray Hemendra Kumar Roy Syed Mustafa Siraj
Medieval Bengal literary scene
Nur Qutb Alam Maladhar Basu Ghanaram Chakrabarty Mukundaram Chakrabarti Rupram Chakrabarty Chandidas Kashiram Das Govindadasa Krishnadasa Kaviraja Ketakadas Kshemananda Dvija Madhab Krittibas Ojha Ramai Pandit Bipradas Pipilai Bharatchandra Ray Vidyapati
Other authors from early modern period
Akshay Kumar Baral Manoranjan Byapari Nirupama Devi Swarnakumari Devi Romesh Chunder Dutt Anil Kumar Gain Dipak Giri Ishwar Chandra Gupta Peary Chand Mitra Parijat Indra Bahadur Rai Dwijendralal Ray Begum Rokeya Kaliprasanna Singha Jyotirindranath Tagore Swami Vivekananda
Prominent foreign-language authors from Bengal
Sri Aurobindo Anirban Bhattacharyya Upamanyu Chatterjee Amit Chaudhuri Souhardya De Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni Toru Dutt Kaberi Gayen Amitav Ghosh Dipak Giri Jhumpa Lahiri Mimi Mondal Pritish Nandy
Other authors from early/mid-twentieth century and some contemporary authors
Anita Agnihotri Ekram Ali Afsar Amed Jatindramohan Bagchi Tarasankar Bandyopadhyay Tapan Bandyopadhyay Subimal Basak Abul Bashar Sukanta Bhattacharya Nachiketa Chakraborty Nirendranath Chakravarty Shibram Chakraborty Smaranjit Chakraborty Sandipan Chattopadhyay Sanjib Chattopadhyay Sasthipada Chattopadhyay Shakti Chattopadhyay Malay Roy Choudhury Salil Chowdhury Alokeranjan Dasgupta Buddhadeb Dasgupta Anish Deb Nabaneeta Dev Sen Mahasweta Devi Anil Kumar Gain Kaberi Gayen Narayan Gangopadhyay Joy Goswami Prabir Ghosh Santosh Kumar Ghosh Shankha Ghosh Subodh Ghosh Dipak Giri Buddhadeb Guha Pracheta Gupta Baby Halder Moinul Hassan Syed Kawsar Jamal Humayun Kabir Bimal Kar Binoy Majumdar Samaresh Majumdar Tarun Mandal Amar Mitra Arun Mitra Bimal Mitra Narendranath Mitra Ashutosh Mukhopadhyay Bibhutibhushan Mukhopadhyay Subhash Mukhopadhyay Kumud Ranjan Mullick Moti Nandi Purnendu Pattrea Sheikh Abdur Rahim Dilipkumar Roy Samir Roychoudhury Sankar Narayan Sanyal Subodh Sarkar Jatindranath Sengupta Mallika Sengupta Syed Mustafa Siraj
Journalists
Ekram Ali Tamal Bandyopadhyay Mrinal Chatterjee Ramananda Chatterjee Sunanda K. Datta-Ray Tushar Kanti Ghosh Chandan Mitra Moti Nandi Pritish Nandy Sukumar Ray Barun Sengupta
Comics writers
Narayan Debnath
Language/linguistics, anthropology, history, and other social sciences
Haricharan Bandopadhayaya, lexicographer Rajshekhar Basu, major contributor for scientific terms in Bengali and lexicographer Chandril Bhattacharya, born in Kolkata Girindrasekhar Bose, first non-European correspondent of Freud Nirmal Kumar Bose, anthropologist, associate of Gandhi Suniti Kumar Chatterji, linguist Debiprasad Chattopadhyaya, social philosopher Kirti N. Chaudhuri, historian Pramatha Chaudhuri, creator of modern Bengali prose (chalit bhasha) along with Tagore Harinath De, linguist Romesh Chunder Dutt, historian Anil Kumar Gain, fellow of the Royal Society Dipak Giri, Indian sociologist Biraja Sankar Guha, anthropologist Ranajit Guha, subaltern theorist R. C. Majumdar, historian Vina Mazumdar, women's studies academic Rajendralal Mitra, first Indian to work with Indologists Bhudev Mukhopadhyay, earliest educationist Niharranjan Ray, historian Hem Chandra Raychaudhuri, Indian historian Tapan Raychaudhuri, professor of history at Oxford University Raja Ram Mohan Roy, first Bengali prose writer Jadunath Sarkar, historian Sumit Sarkar, historian Susobhan Sarkar, historian Amartya Sen, Nobel Prize awardee in Economics Dinesh Chandra Sen, historian of Bengali literature and folklorist Sukumar Sen, linguist Hara Prasad Shastri, historian of Bengali language and culture Maniklal Sinha, novelist, historian and archaeologist of west Rarh Surajit Chandra Sinha, anthropologist Dineshchandra Sircar, epigraphist Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, literature theorist. Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar, creator of Standard Bengali prose (sadhu bhasha)
Scholars and polymaths
Asima Chatterjee, scholar of chemistryThe Shaping of Indian Science. p. 1036. Indian Science Congress Association, Presidential Addresses By Indian Science Congress Association. Published by Orient Blackswan, 2003. Suniti Kumar Chatterji, linguist Amlan Datta, economist, Vice Chancellor of Visva Bharati Radhakanta Deb, linguist Anil Kumar Gain, scholar, mathematician Dipak Giri, scholar, English literature and sociology Prithwindra Mukherjee, scholar of Indian history, philosophy, religion and culture Ashis Nandy, political psychologist Ramendra Sundar Tribedi, scientist
Education
Pioneers
Mahesh Chandra Nyayratna Bhattacharyya Girish Chandra Bose Anil Kumar Gain Muhammad Mohsin Ashutosh Mukherjee Satish Chandra Mukherjee Begum Rokeya Guruchand Thakur Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar
Post-independence
Shuddhaanandaa Brahmachari Sudhi Ranjan Das, Chief Justice of India, Vice-chancellor of Visva Bharati Azizul Haque
Others
Teachers
Babar Ali, world's youngest headmaster, headmaster and founder of Ananda Siksha Niketan Katyayanidas Bhattacharya, philosophy, Presidency College Ramkrishna Bhattacharya, English, Ananda Mohan College Barun De, history, Presidency College Mahasweta Devi, English, Vijaygarh Jyotish Ray College Chinmoy Guha, English, Vijaygarh Jyotish Ray College and University of Calcutta K. C. Nag, mathematics, Mitra institution Susobhan Sarkar, history, Presidency College
Philosophy
Pre-modern period
Chaitanya Mahaprabhu (Achintya Bhedabheda Vedanta) born in Nabadwip of Nadia district to parents who hailed from Sylhet in present day Bangladesh Madhusūdana Sarasvatī (Advaita Vedanta), born in Kotalipara, Gopalganj District in present day Bangladesh & studied at Nabadwip in Nadia district Raghunatha Shiromani (Navya Nyaya) from Nabadwip
Modern age
Sri Aurobindo Abu Sayeed Ayyub, born in Kolkata Krishna Chandra Bhattacharya born in Serampore in Howrah district Anukulchandra Chakravarty born in Pabna district in present day Bangladesh, worked & preached in Kolkata. After the Partition of India in 1947, he relocated to Deoghar Surendranath Dasgupta, born in Kusthia of present day Bangladesh which was then a part of Nadia before Partition of India, studied in Kolkata Balaram Hari, born in Nadia Bimal Krishna Matilal, born in Jaynagar Majilpur in South 24 Parganas district Amartya Sen, born in Shantiniketan in Birbhum District Keshub Chandra Sen, born in Kolkata Rabindranath Tagore, born in Kolkata Swami Vivekananda, born in Kolkata
Early / Mid twenty century
Shuddhaanandaa Brahmachari, born in Kolkata Debiprasad Chattopadhyaya, philosophy, University of Calcutta Sibnarayan Ray, born in kolkata
Science
Sanghamitra Bandyopadhyay, computer scientist Amar Nath Bhaduri, Indian molecular enzymologist and chemical biologist Somnath Bharadwaj, cosmology Avik Bhattacharya, remote sensing Santanu Bhattacharya, chemistry Bhabatarak Bhattacharyya, Indian structural biologist, biochemist Mani Lal Bhaumik Birendra Bijoy Biswas, Indian molecular biologist and geneticist Satyendra Nath Bose, Indian theoretical physicist and mathematician Upendranath Brahmachari Bidyut Baran Chaudhuri, computer scientist Asis Datta, Indian biochemist, molecular biologist and genetic engineer Moumita Dutta, Indian physicist Anil Kumar Gain, mathematics Partha Ghose Sankar Ghosh, Indian-American immunologist, microbiologist, and biochemist Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis Chanchal Kumar Majumdar, Indian condensed matter physicist Dwijesh Dutta Majumdar, computer scientist Ujjwal Maulik, computer scientist Ashesh Prosad Mitra Sisir Kumar Mitra, Indian physicist Mahan Mj, Mathematician Subhash Mukhopadhyay, physician Indira Nath, Indian immunologist Bedabrata Pain, NASA Scientist Sankar Kumar Pal, computer scientist Shehla Pervin, molecular biologist Prafulla Chandra Ray, Indian chemist, industrialist and philanthropist Amal Kumar Raychaudhuri Somak Raychaudhury, Indian astrophysicist Anjali Roy, mycologist Subrata Roy, plasma physics Ram Brahma Sanyal, zoology Debi Prasad Sarkar, Indian biochemist, immunologist and virologist Amartya Sen, Nobel Laureate, economist, Bank of Sweden Prize in Economic Sciences Ashoke Sen, physics Radhanath Sikdar Snehasikta Swarnakar, Indian chemical biologist
Religious scholars Muslim Jalaluddin Tabrizi (13th-century) Gazi Pir (13th-century) Pir Gorachand (13th-century) Usman Serajuddin (1258–1357) Alaul Haq (1301–1384) Nur Qutb Alam (d. 1416) Shah Mehr Ali (1808–1868) Ubaidullah Al Ubaidi Suhrawardy (1832–1885) Azangachhi Shaheb (1828–1932) Mohammad Abu Bakr Siddique (1865–1943) Abdullah al-Baqi (1886–1952) Abbas Siddiqui (born 1987)
Pre-modern period
Krishnananda Agamavagisha Chaitanya Mahaprabhu Nityananda Ramprasad Sen Six Goswamis of Vrindavan
The Brahmo Samaj
Anandamohan Bose Raja Ram Mohan Roy Keshub Chandra Sen Debendranath Tagore Ram Chandra Vidyabagish
Hindu revival movement
Sri Aurobindo Sarada Devi Ramakrishna Swami Vivekananda
Mid-twentieth-century religious figures
Swami Sri Yukteswar Giri Lahiri Mahasaya A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada Paramahansa Yogananda
Social reformation and social work
Major figures
Anil Kumar Gain Dwarkanath Ganguly Nibaran Chandra Mukherjee Satish Chandra Mukherjee Protap Chunder Mozoomdar Raja Ram Mohan Roy Keshub Chandra Sen Harichand Thakur Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar Swami Vivekananda
Derozians
Krishna Mohan Banerjee Rajnarayan Basu Michael Madhusudan Dutt Hara Chandra Ghosh Ramgopal Ghosh Ramtanu Lahiri Rasik Krishna Mallick Kishori Chand Mitra Peary Chand Mitra Radhanath Sikdar
Women's rights
Chandramukhi Basu Sarala Devi Kadambini Ganguly Kaberi Gayen Joyita Mondal, social worker Charulata Mukherjee Rani Rashmoni Begum Rokeya Romola Sinha
Military
Air Vice Marshal Madhavendra Banerji, recipient of Maha Vir Chakra Flight Lieutenant Suhas Biswas, recipient of Ashoka Chakra Subhas Chandra Bose, founder, Indian National Army General Jayanto Nath Chaudhuri, Indian Army Chief during the Indo-Pakistani War of 1965 Admiral Adhar Kumar Chatterji, Indian Navy Chief between 1966 and 1970 Air Commodore Sudhindra Kumar Majumdar (1927–2011), India's first military helicopter pilot Air Marshal Subroto Mukerjee, former Head of Indian Air Force Chief of the Air Staff Arup Raha, 24th chief of Indian Air Force Captain Man Bahadur Rai, recipient of Ashoka Chakra Indra Lal Roy, first Indian (pre Independence) flying ace General Shankar Roychowdhury, former Indian Army Chief William Tolly (1715–1784), an officer of the British East India Company
Art
Early modern period
Ramkinkar Baij Nandalal Bose Mukul Dey Kalipada Ghoshal Sailoz Mookherjea Benode Behari Mukherjee Jamini Roy