Jyotirmoyee Devi Sen was born in 1894, in the kingdom of Jaipur, during the time of the British Raj in India. Her grandfather, who had emigrated there from Bengal, rose to the position of dewan, or prime minister, to the Maharaja of Jaipur. The lives of the queens and concubines in the royal harems made a deep impression on her.
She married Kiran Chandra Sen of Guptipara, Bengal, who passed away during the influenza pandemic of 1918. Returning with her children to her parents’ home, she wrote under the pen name Jyotirmoyee Devi during her long widowhood. Jyotirmoyee Devi Sen is among the earlier women writers of modern Bengal, when most women were not allowed educational opportunities. She won the prestigious Rabindra Puraskar for Bengali writing and her work is part of the Women’s Studies curriculum at Jadavpur University, Kolkata.