Bijoya Ray

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Bijoya Ray (Bengali: বিজয়া রায়) is the widow of the famous film director Satyajit Ray. Her son Sandip Ray is also a film director. Bijoya and Satyajit happened to be close cousins. After a long courtship, they were married in 1949. Bijoya Ray acted and sang playback song in a Bengali movie called Sesh Raksha in 1944 and also acted in the documentary Gaach (The Tree) by Catherine Berge in 1998.

Bijoya Ray was born as Bijoya Das to Charu Chandra Das, a barrister and Madhuri Devi in October 1918. She was the youngest of four daughters. One of her elder sibling Sati Devi was well known singer and musical exponent who worked with Uday Shankar in Almora and at Prithvi Theatre in Bombay and her daughter Ruma Guha Thakurta is a well known personality in music and acting world. Bijoya grew up in Patna and was formerly educated in a convent. She had a gifted voice and her father wanted to send her to paris to be trained in soprano and western classical music. In 1931, when she was thirteen her father died and she along with her mother and sisters had to come to Calcutta to her paternal uncle Prasant Das's house. It was here he met her first cousin Satyajit. They were drawn to each other very soon and their common interests were Film and western classical music. Bijoya graduated from Bethune College, Calcutta and after working as a clerk in a government office, she went to Bombay to start a film career. She worked in few films without success or satisfaction. In 1949 she married Satyajit Ray and got settled. Their only son and child Sandip was born in 1953. Bijoya Ray remained a constant inspiration and influence in Ray's life. She now lives in Calcutta with her son Sandip, daughterin-law Lalita and grandson Saurodip.