Aparna Sen née Dasgupta was born in the year 1945 October 25 in kolkata to a Bengali Brahmo family, originally from East Bengal. Her father is the veteran critic and film-maker Chidananda Dasgupta. Aparna sen mother Supriya Dasgupta is the cousin of renowned Bengali poet Jibanananda Das. Aparna sen her childhood in Hazaribagh and Kolkata and had her schooling in Modern High School for Girls, Kolkata.She studied her BA, English honors in Presidency College, Calcutta but did not complete the degree. She is the winner of three National Film Awards and eight international film festival awards.
Aparna sen met the Magnum photographer, Brian Brake, in Kolkata in 1961 when he was visiting India to photograph his Monsoon series. The photo shoot was set up on a Kolkata rooftop with a ladder and a watering can.
Aparna sen would work with Satyajit Ray in several of his films, including the short Pikoo 1981, where she played the role of an adulterous wife and mother. In 1965, Sen resumed her film career in Mrinal Sen’s Akash Kusum. From then until the end of the 1970s, she worked steadily in the Bengali film industry. She acted in a number of Hindi films as well during this time.. She would make two more films with Merchant-Ivory, Bombay Talkie 1970, and Hullabaloo over Georgie and Bonnie’s Pictures 1978.
Aparna acted with Rajinikanth in 1981 Tamil hit Thee produced by Balaji as Rajini’s lover.Aparna sen, Sharmila Tagore and Rahul Bose are working together for Annirudh Roy-Chowdhary’s Bengali film Antaheen. Aparna sen debut feature, won the Best Director award at the Indian National Film Awards. 36 Chowringhee Lane also won the Grand Prix the Golden Eagle at the Manila International Film Festival
She followed up this early success with several other films, notably Paroma 1984, Sati 1989 and Yugant 1995. These examined the feminine condition in modern-day India from different perspectives. She also starred in Unishe April 1994, the film by Bengali cinema’s Rituparno Ghosh.
Sen has been married three times. Her first marriage, to Sanjay Sen, was when she was quite young. Her second husband was the science writer and journalist, Mukul Sharma. They later divorced amicably. Sen is presently married to Kalyan Ray, an author and professor of English who teaches at County College of Morris in Randolph, New Jersey, in the United States. She has two daughters, Kamalini and Konkona – who is also an actress- and two grandchildren.