Sisir Kumar Mitra

Early life and education

Photograph of S.K. Mitra from the January 1916 issue of The Hindusthanee Student.

Mitra was born in his father's hometown of Konnagar, a suburb of Kolkata (then Calcutta) located in the Hooghly District in the Bengal Presidency (present-day West Bengal). He was the third son of Joykrishna Mitra, who was a schoolteacher at the time of Mitra's birth, and Saratkumari, a medical student whose family came from Midnapore. While Mitra's paternal family were orthodox Hindus, his mother's family were adherents of the progressive Brahmo Samaj, and were noted in Midnapore for their advanced outlook. The story prompted Mitra to ask his elder brother Satish Kumar about the principles of lighter-than-air flight; his brother explained as best as he could. A few years afterwards, both of Mitra's elder brothers died; following this death, Joykrishna soon had a paralytic attack and became disabled. Despite the family's increasing financial burdens, Saratkumari managed to educate her two surviving sons. For this work, which Raman greatly appreciated, Mitra gained a D.Sc. degree in 1919.

Fellowship of the Royal Society, 1958

Fellow of the Asiatic Society of Bengal (FASB)

Fellow of the Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science (FIAS; 1943)

Presidency of The Asiatic Society, 1951–53.

Presidency of the Indian National Science Academy, 1959–60.

National Professorship, 1962.

Padma Bhushan, 1962.

S. K. Mitra Center for Research in Space Environment of the University of Calcutta is named for him.

The crater Mitra on the Moon is named after him.