[1] Bhattacharya was born in a Bengali Hindu Brahmin family on 31 January 1941 in the village of Jantari in erstwhile greater Sylhet district of British India.

[1] In 1968, Bhattacharya joined Dhaka University as a lecturer in the newly opened Department of Applied Physics.

He obtained a scholarship for higher studies under the Colombo plan and was scheduled to leave for London on 26 March 1971.

Bhattacharya was shot in front of the Jagannath Hall building and buried in a mass grave.

[1] In 1995, the Government of Bangladesh issued a commemorative stamp in his name on 14 December, Martyred Intellectuals Day.