Sisir Kumar Mitra, 1890-1963

Abstract Sisir Kumar Mitra was born at Konnagar, a suburb of Calcutta, on 24 October 1890. He was the third son of Joy Krishna Mitra, a school teacher. His mother had been trained at the Campbell Medical School in Calcutta, a rare qualification in those days for an Indian woman. After passing her examination in 1892, she obtained a post in the Lady Dufferin Hospital at Bhagalpur and the family moved to that town, Mitra’s father taking a post as a clerk in the local municipal offices. S. K. Mitra first went to school in Bhagalpur and there showed a serious interest in scientific studies. A few years later his two elder brothers died and his father became paralysed, and he would have had to leave school, had it not been for the insistence of his mother, an outstanding woman, that he should continue his education while she supported the family on her earnings from the hospital. After leaving school he went to the T.N.J. College, Bhagalpur, and from there in 1908 to Presidency College, Calcutta, where in 1912 he headed the list of successful candidates for the M.Sc. degree in physics. The financial circumstances of the family then compelled him to find paid employment and he started as a lecturer in the T.N.J. College at Bhagalpur, and later transferred to the Christian College, Bankura. At this time the University of Calcutta was rapidly developing along western lines, particularly in science and technology, and in 1916 Mitra was invited to become a lecturer in the newly formed post-graduate department of physics. This appointment at the age of 26 marked the start of his scientific career.