Sipra Mitra

Sipra Mitra was born on the 30th of March, 1930, the daughter of Abhaya Pada Chattopadhyay, an engineer working for the Indian Railways and Prabhasini Devi. Her childhood was spent at Katihar, Bihar and at the age of seven or eight, she came to Bengal and stayed at Kanchrapara, close to Calcutta. Her acting and musical inclinations were noticed from an early age and with encouragement from both her parents and she had joined the All India Radio taking part in radio plays and soon she was cutting discs as well. Her first record was from Senola Company with Sukriti Sen as music director. This was in 1944. Her other contributions to the record world was in record plays of Debdas, Chirakumar Sabha and Shahar Theke Durey. It was none other than the great P.C. Barua who procured her services for Debdas while Jahar Ganguly was instrumental in her participation in the other two. Kananika entered the film world with Bhabikal (1945) as the heroine and was not only noticed but got recognized as star material. Her name was very similar to that of Kanan Devi and therefore Sipra became her screen name. The films that followed included Kalo Chhaya, Padma Pramatta Nadi, Rang Berang, Ulto Rath, Sir Sankarnath, Kuasha, Krishan, Sahodar and some others where she played the lead but with the passage of time graduated to character roles and here in one film after another she left her mark as a fine spontaneous actress. Sipra Mitra was associated with the Bengal stage also. Her first stage appearance was in 1954 in Durbhasini in the role of Kamala at Rangmahal Theatre. In 1957 she joined the Star and Played Rajlakhsmi in Sarat Chandra Chatterjee's classic novel Srikanta. In 1960, she returned to Rangmahal and played Pateswari in Saheb Bibi Golam. In each of these plays songs of Sipra Mitra were such as to bring back the crowd to the theatre again and again. Apart from the regular professional stage, Sipra Mitra took part in several plays of Kanan Devi's Mahila Shilpi Mahal and Molina Devi's M.G. Enterprise. She was also member of Abhinetri Sangha and Shilpi Sangsad. Sipra Mitra was married to actor producer Sisir Mitra but the marriage ended in a divorce. She starred in most of her husband's films. In her last days Mitra was troubled with orthopedic problems and could hardly walk freely. In the early hours of the 23rd of May, 2009 the end came. She was survived by her son and daughter in law.