Eminent Bengali singer Utpala Sen, who sang for legendary music directors S D Burman, Pankaj Mullick and Raichand Baral, died on Friday at the SSKM hospital in Kolkata after a protracted illness.
She was 81, and is survived by a son.
Family sources told PTI that she was suffering from cancer, and was admitted to the SSKM hospital with respiratory illness.
Sen was the wife of Bengali singer Satinath Mukherjee who died in 1992.
Born in Dhaka, Sen sang on Dhaka Radio and her first record hit the market in 1939.
She shot to fame in 1941 with the song Ek hate mor pujar thala under music director Sudhirlal Chakraborty.
Her songs, total about 7,000, including film and non-film numbers.