Madhusudan Das was born to a zamindar family on 28 April, 1848 at Satyabhamapur, 20 kilometres from Cuttack. His father was Choudhury Raghunath Das and mother, Parbati Devi. They had initially named him Gobindaballabh. He had two elder sisters, and a younger brother named Gopalballabh. Gopalballabh was a Magistrate in Bihar Province and was the father of Ramadevi Choudhury who later became a prominent freedom fighter and an ardent follower of Mahatma Gandhi.

Utkala Gouraba Madhusudan Das was an Odia nationalist, a legendary lawyer and social reformer. He founded the Utkal Sammilani in 1903 to coordinate scattered campaigns for the unification of Odia-speaking areas lying scattered in different neighbouring states. He was on the forefront of the movement for creation of a separate Odisha province (Swatantra Utkal Pradesh, the present-day Odisha) which was established on 1 April, 1936. Madhusudan  was the first man to initiate steps for Odisha’s industrial development by establishing the Utkal Tannery and a training centre at his residence for preservation and development of the world famous Cuttack Filigree Works. He was also the first graduate and the first advocate of Orissa. As an advocate Madhubabu is a legend who has no equals so far in the state. His birthday is celebrated as the Lawyers Day in the state on 28 April.

As a writer and poet, patriotism was always on the top of his mind, and that was reflected in all of his literary works. He penned a number of articles and poems in both English and Odia. Some of his important poems are ‘Utkal Santan’, ‘Jati Itihash’ and ‘Jananira Ukti’. He was also an influential speaker in Odia, Bengali and English.

Also known as Madhubabu, he is also fondly addressed by the Odia people as Kulabruddha (Grand Oldman) Madhusudan Das and Utkala Gourav (the pride of Utkal) Madhusudan Das. 

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