Answer:
Raj Chandra Bose was born in Hoshangabad, a town in central India, but he was brought up in Rohtak, a town in Haryana state in northwestern India. His father, Protap Chandra Bose, had served as a doctor in the British army before becoming a doctor in the town of Rohtak. Protap Chandra Bose's first wife died without any children being born, and he then married Ushangini Mitra from the town of Hoshangabad who had met while visiting his sister who lived in that town. Raj Chandra, the eldest of his parents' four children, was born in Hoshangabad since his mother had returned to her parents' home to have her first child. His brother was born in 1905 and his three sisters were born in 1907, 1910 and 1914. It was a happy childhood but one in which he was expected to work hard at his academic studies. His father was ambitious for his eldest son and pushed him hard. Anything other than top of the class was considered a failure so, for example, when Raj Chandra only came second in the geography examination in the eighth grade his father demanded that he learn the geography textbook by heart - something which he did not find too hard since he had a photographic memory.
After completing his schooling at the Government High School in Rohtak, Bose entered the Hindu College in Delhi in April 1917. He had caught influenza at the time he was sitting the scholarship examinations for the Punjab University and failed to gain a high enough rank for a scholarship. His happy childhood and rewarding time studying at the Hindu College came to a tragic end in October 1918 when his mother died in the worldwide influenza epidemic. This epidemic, also called the Spanish influenza epidemic, killed millions throughout the word with over 12 million people dying in India alone. Despite the loss of his mother, Bose came first in the 1919 Intermediate Examination at the Punjab University. In January 1920 Bose's father died from a stroke and he was left as the eldest in the family with all the responsibility that gave yet little money to either educate himself or look after the family. He arranged for cousins to live rent free in his family home in Rohtak in exchange for looking after his brother and sisters. In 1921 his brother completed his schooling and Bose brought him and his sisters to Delhi where they all lived in a single room. He made some money tutoring but times were exceptionally difficult especially when he gave up tutoring before his final B.A. examinations in 1922 to enable him to prepare properly:-
Only a few days were left for his B.A. examination. Raj Chandra Bose was lost in his books. But his sister came with a problem. There was hardly any food left in the house. It was an urgent problem but nothing new. In the past three years he had faced one crisis after another. ... he remembered that there were still some medicines, including a bottle of quinine, in his father's medicine chest. It was soon after World War I and medicines were scarce and costly in India. A bottle of quinine fetched him a handsome amount. The crisis was overcome. Raj Chandra took his B.A. examination and passed it successfully.