Bose, Basu, Bosu, Boshu or Bosh (, ) is a Bengali Kayastha surname found amongst upper caste Kulin Kayasthas of Indian state of West Bengal and Bangladesh. The traditional Bengali version is Bosu, which is sometimes written Basu, which is alternately spelled as Bose. It stems from Sanskrit  (, a name of Viṣṇu meaning ‘dwelling in all beings’).

History 
Boses belong to Kayastha caste in Bengal. The Bengali Kayasthas evolved between the 5th/6th century AD and 11th/12th century AD, its component elements being putative Kshatriyas and mostly Brahmins, according to André Wink. Boses are considered as Kulin Kayasthas of Gautam gotra, along with Ghoshes, Mitras and Guhas.

Notables of Indian descent

A
 Abala Bose (1865–1951), Indian social worker
 Amar Bose (1929–2013), MIT professor, founder and chairman of the Bose Corporation
 Amit Bose (government official) Administrator of Federal Railroad Administration
 Amit Bose (1930-2019), Indian filmmaker
 Amit Bose (born circa 1972), American attorney and transportation policy advisor
 Aniruddha Bose judge of Supreme Court of India since 2019
 Ankiti Bose (born 1992), Indian entrepreneur who works on the digitisation of the textile and apparel industry
 Anurag Basu film director
 Ashish Bose (1930–2014), Demographer who coined BIMARU

B
 Benoy Basu (1908–1930), Indian revolutionary
 Bipasha Basu Indian actress, model and represented India at Ford Models Supermodel of the World
 Bipin Krishna Bose Barrister, first Vice Chancellor of Nagpur University (1923–1928)
 Buddhadeb Bosu (1908–1974), Bengali writer

C
 C. V. Ananda Bose Governor Of Bengal
 Chandranath Basu doyen of economic nationalism in Bengal

F
 Fanindra Nath Bose (1888–1926), Bengal-born sculptor

G 

 Girish Chandra Bose (1853–1939), Indian educator and botanist

H
 Hemendra Mohan Bose, entrepreneur

J
 Jagadish Chandra Bose (1858–1935), Bengali physicist, science fiction writer, and student of radio science
 Jyoti Basu (1914–2010), Indian politician of the Communist Party (Marxist), 6th chief minister of West Bengal

K
 Kamal Bose (1915–1995), Indian cinematographer
 Kaushik Basu (born 1952), Professor of Economics at Cornell and Chief Economist at World Bank
 Khudiram Bose (1889–1908), Indian freedom fighter

M
 Mankumari Basu (1863–1943), Bengali poet
 Mihir Bose (born 1947), Indian-born British journalist, former BBC's sports editor

N
 N. S. Chandra Bose (1932–2010), medical doctor and politician
 Nandalal Bose (1883–1966), Indian painter

P
 Pratap Bose (born 1974), British-Indian automotive designer

R
 Rahul Bose (born 1967), Indian actor
 Raj Chandra Bose (1901–1987), Indian mathematician and statistician
 Rajsekhar Bose (1880–1960), Bengali writer, chemist and lexicographer
 Rash Behari Bose (1886–1945), Indian freedom fighter

S
 Sachindra Prasad Bose (died 1941), designer of the Calcutta Flag
 Sahay Ram Bose (1888-1970), Indian botanist
 Sarat Chandra Bose (1889–1950), Indian lawyer and freedom fighter (brother of Subhas Chandra Bose)
 Sarmila Bose (born 1959), Indian journalist and researcher
 Satyendra Nath Bose (1894–1974), Indian physicist, known for the Bose–Einstein collaborations
 Shree Bose (born 1994), American scientist
 Soumya Sankar Bose (born 1990), Indian Artist and Photographer 
 Subhas Chandra Bose (1897–1945), fighter of the Indian independence movement and personality of the Indian National Army
 Subhasish Bose (born 1995), Indian footballer
 Sudhindra Bose (1883–1946), pioneer in teaching Asian politics and civilization in the United States
 Sugata Bose (born 1956), Harvard professor, Member of Parliament and grandnephew of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose
 Swadesh Bose (1928–2009), Bangladeshi economist

U
 Uma Bose (1921–1942), 'The Nightingale of Bengal', musical prodigy

V
 Vivian Bose (1891–1983), judge of the Supreme Court of India

Notable others

 Georg Matthias Bose, (1710-1761), Leipzig born professor of natural philosophy and electrostatics inventor
 Sterling Bose (1906–1959), American jazz trumpeter and cornetist
 Sudip Bose, American emergency physician

von Bose is an unrelated German surname
 Hans-Jürgen von Bose (born 1953), German composer
 Herbert von Bose (1893–1934), German civil servant
 Jobst-Hilmar von Bose (1897–1949), German soldier
 Julius von Bose (1809–1894), Prussian Army general
 Countess Louise von Bose (1813–1883), German philanthropist

Bosé is an unrelated European surname
 Lucia Bosè (Italian spelling, born Lucia Borloni) or Lucía Bosé (Spanish spelling) (1931–2020), Italian actress
 Miguel Bosé (born 1956), Spanish singer and son of Lucia Bosè

See also
Bose (given name)

References

Surnames
Indian surnames
Hindu surnames
Bengali-language surnames
Bengali Hindu surnames