Son of Dolgovinda Dey, Mahendranath Dey(1872-1912) was born in Jagthi, Silchar in undivided Bengal. He stood second in the Entrance Examination from Assam followed by his securing third position in the First Arts Examination of the Calcutta University; for which he was awarded a state scholarship. After his B Sc degree, he joined the Kishoreganj High School as the headmaster; but gave it up after the school authority restrained him to attend the Mymensingh convention of the Bangiya Pradeshik Rashtra Samithi of Surendranath Bandyopadhyay.
He then did his masters in ematics and joined a private college as a teacher, but soon left it to join the National Council of Education on poor pay during the anti-Partition movement. A ematician with an interest in astrology, Mahendranath was also a linguist by choice with the knowledge of twelve languages. Restless, he soon turned to an ascetic life, after his indoctrination from Dayananda.
Back in his village Jagatshi, he established an ashram and devoted himself to religious invocations. But, the SDO Mr. Gordon, on the basis of a report from a section of the local population, took it to be a revolutionary shelter. On the 7th June 1912, he came to conduct a search in the ashram premises at the head of a large police force; in the course of which the modesty of women inmates was outraged, men mercilessly beaten and properties destroyed. When Mahendranath came out to oppose all these, he was shot dead by the police.
Source: Nihar Roy, Biplabi: Jader Mane Rakhini, 2021, in Bengali; Kalicharan Ghosh, Jagaran O Bisforan, 1380 BS, in Bengali; Subodhchandra Sengupta Ed., Samsad Bangali Charitabhidhan, 1976, in Bengali.