Bengali science fiction ( Bangla Bigyan Kalpakahini) is a part of Bengali literature containing science fiction elements. It is called Kalpabigyan ( ) or stories of imaginative science, in Bengali literature. The term was first coined by Adrish Bardhan during his editorship years.
Earliest writers
Bengali writers wrote various science fiction works in the 19th and early 20th centuries during the British Raj, before the partition of India. Isaac Asimov's assertion that "true science fiction could not really exist until people understood the rationalism of science and began to use it with respect in their stories" is true for the earliest science fiction written in the Bengali language.
Though not particularly science fiction, as tales of speculative fiction and alternate history, and vision of the future, the first notable work was by Kailash Chandra Dutta (1817-1857), in his "A Journal of Forty-Eight Hours in the Year 1945". Written as a submitted piece for a competition at Hindu College, this was later published in Calcutta Literary Gazette (06.06.1835). Dutta was only eighteen years when he wrote the story describing a revolution of the students of Hindu College against the Raj. Shashi Chandra Dutta (1824-1886), another notable name from the same family, wrote "The Republic of Odisha, A Page from The Annals of the 20th Century". Published in The Evening Harkaru's on 25 May 1845, Dutta's work depicts the birth of an independent Odisha state as a republic, from the hands of the British Raj, in the year 1916. These two pieces of alternate history are also Bengali's first notable works in English. Another alumnus of Hindu College, Sri Bhudev Mukhopadhyay, also called the father of Bengali historical fiction, in 1857, published a collection of two novels as a book called "Anguriyo Binimoy". Inspired by the English book Romance of History, "Anguriyo Binimoy" (The Exchange of Rings) is also a classic example in the alternate history genre. Mukhopadhyay's other take in this genre was "Swopnolobdho Varoter Itihas" (The History of India: A Dream Sequence). According to notable writer Siddhartha Ghosh, the first science fiction in Bengali literature was Hemlal Dutta's "Rahashyo" (The Mystery), published in the Biggyan Darpan (Mirror of Science) magazine, in 1882. Though written as a comical interpretation of Britain's industrial age, Dutta's story dwells with vivid descriptions of steampunk automation. Yet, due to its comical heart, Dutta's work cannot be classified as true science fiction, just as Charlie Chaplin's "Modern Tales". (Anish Deb, UFO, a collection of essays).
The earliest notable Bengali science fiction was Jagadananda Roy's "Shukra Bhraman" (Travels to Venus). This story is of particular interest to literary historians, as it described a journey to another planet; its description of the alien creatures that are seen in Venus used an evolutionary theory similar to the origins of man: "They resembled our apes to a large extent. Their bodies were covered with dense black fur. Their heads were larger in comparison with their bodies, limbs sported long nails and they were completely naked." Until the recent findings, Roy's work was not considered the first science fiction in Bengali, as it was available only in its book form, Prakritiki, published in 1914.
Although Roy mentioned in the introduction of his book, that he wrote the story nearly 22 years before Prakritiki's first publication, researchers took his words with a grain of salt, due to the unavailability of the source material. It was considered to be inspired by Wells’ seminal The War of the Worlds. Recently, it was found that Roy did publish his work, in 1895, in Varoti Magazine. His work predated Wells.
Some specialists credit Hemlal Dutta as one of the earliest Bengali science fiction writers for his "Rohosso" (The Mystery). This story was published in two installments in 1882 in the pictorial magazine Bigyan Darpan.
In 1896, Jagadish Chandra Bose, considered to be the father of Bengali science fiction, wrote "Niruddesher Kahini". This tale of weather control, one of the first Bengali science fiction works, features getting rid of a cyclone using a little bottle of hair oil ("Kuntol Keshori"). Later, he included the story with changes in the collection of essays titled "Abyakto" (1921) as "Palatak Tufan" (Runaway Cyclone). Both versions of the story have been translated into English by Bodhisattva Chattopadhyay.