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He is the son of Kumud Kanta Ray, ICS who was a Home Secretary of West Bengal. His grandfather, Kamakshya Ray was a contemporary of Rathindranath Tagore in Santiniketan.

He completed his schooling at Ballygunge Government High School, Calcutta, and his B.A. (Honours) in History, with a first class first, at Presidency College, Calcutta where he was a student of Ashin Dasgupta. He then completed his Ph.D. under the supervision of Eric Stokes at the University of Cambridge.

He was an Assistant Professor of History at the Indian Institute of Management, Calcutta. From 1975-2007 he was the Professor and from 1982 the Head of the Department of History at Presidency College, Calcutta. He is one of the longest serving departmental heads of the college and one of its legendary teachers. Presently, he is the Upacharya of Visva Bharati.

Books

• The Felt Community: Commonality and Mentality Before the Emergence of Indian Nationalism, (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2007)
• Exploring Emotional History: Gender, Mentality, and Literature in the Indian Awakening (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2001)
• (ed.) Mind, Body and Society: Life and Mentality in Colonial Bengal (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1996)
• Palasir Sharayantra O Sekaler Samaj (1994) (in Bengali)
• (with Basudeb Chattopadhyay and Hari S. Vasudevan) (eds.), Dissent and Consensus: Protest in Pre-Industrial Societies (Calcutta: K.P.Bagchi, 1989)
• Social Conflict and Political Unrest in Bengal 1875-1927 (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1985)
• The Evolution of the Professional Structure in Modern India: Older and New Professions in a Changing Society (1983)
• Urban Roots of Indian Nationalism: Pressure Groups and Conflict of Interests in Calcutta City Politics, 1875-1939 (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1979)
• Industrialization in India: Growth and Conflict in the Private Corporate Sector, 1914-47 (1979)

Articles

• "Foreword" to D.A. Low (ed.) Congress and the Raj: Facets of the Indian Struggle 1917 - 47, (2006)
• "Indian Society and the Establishment of British Supremacy" in P.J. Marshall and Alaine Low, (eds.) The Oxford History of the British Empire, Vol. II, The Eighteenth Century, (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1998)
• "Asian Capital in the Age of European Domination: The Rise of the Bazaar, 1800-1914," Modern Asian Studies, 29.3 (1995): 449-554
• "Merchants and Politics: From the Great Mughals to the East India Company", with Lakshmi Subramanian, in Dwijendra Tripathi (ed.), Business and Politics in India: A historical perspective, (New Delhi, 1991)
• "The Raj, the Congress and the Bengal Gentry 1880-1905" in Rajat Kanta Ray, Basudeb Chattopadhyay and Hari S. Vasudevan (eds.), Dissent and Consensus: Protest in Pre-Industrial Societies, (Calcutta: K.P.Bagchi, 1989)
• "The Retreat of the Jotedars?" Indian Economic and Social History Review, 25. 2, 1988
• "Moderates, Extremists and Revolutionaries: Bengal, 1900-1908" in Richard Sisson and Stanley Wolpert (eds.), Congress and Indian Nationalism: The Pre-Independence Phase, (Delhi, 1988)
• "The Bazar: Indigenous Sector of the Indian Economy" in Dwijendra Tripathi (ed.), Business Communities of India, (New Delhi, 1984)
• "Pedhis and Mills: The Historical Integration of Formal and Informal Sectors in the Economy of Ahmedabad", Indian Economic and Social History Review, 19:3 & 4, 1982
• (with Ratnalekha Ray), "Zamindars and Jotedars: A Study in Rural Politics in Bengal", Modern Asian Studies, Vol. 9, 1, 1975, pp. 81—102
• "The Crisis in Bengal Agriculture 1870-1927: The Dynamics of Immobility", Indian Economic and Social History Review, 10, 3, 1973, pp. 244—279
• (with Ratnalekha Ray), "The Dynamics of Continuum in Rural Bengal under the British Imperium", Indian Economic and Social History Review, 10, 2, 1973, pp. 103—128