Buddhadev Das Gupta
Award Name : Padma Bhushan
Year of Award : 2012
Award for : Arts
Location : Bhāgalpur, Bihar, India
Buddhadev Das Gupta is
an Indian classical musician who plays the sarod. Pandit Buddhadev Das Gupta
resides in Kolkata, India. He is one of the artists featured in Nimbus
Records's The Raga Guide. He was born on 1 February 1933 in Bhagalpur, Bihar,
India. He studied Mechanical Engineering at the prestigious Bengal Engineering
College, Shibpur, which was then affiliated to the University of Calcutta and
stood 2nd. He received the honorary D.Litt degree from the Bengal Engineering
and Science University, Shibpur (his alma mater) at its annual convocation on
16 February 2010. His father was District Magistrate by profession and an avid
lover of music although he never learnt music. Since childhood little Buddhadev
grew up with a musical atmosphere at his home. At a very early age he started
taking Sarod lessons from the eminent Sarod maestro Sangitachrya sri Radhika
Mohan Maitra. His first program in the All India Radio was as a guest artist.
He has done more than 17 national programs in All India Radio, which is a very
rare incident among known Indian Classiscal Musicians. In 2011, Sarod maestro
Buddhadeb Dasgupta, was offered the Padma Shree by the government of India, but
he turned it down saying "it was far too late in the day". In Jan
2012, he has been conferred with Padma Bhushan by Govt. of India. His famous
autobiography Bamaner Chandrasparshavilash, was periodically published in a
Bengali Magazine "Disha" and has been published in the form of book
in 2004 (part-I) and in 2010 (part-II). The book became instant hit and is a
best-seller among Bengali autobiographies.