Rupa Maitra was born in Dunedin after her Bengali parents migrated to New Zealand in the late 60s from India, via Uganda. She did a music degree at Otago and followed it up with one in medicine - gravitating toward pathology.
Working part-time allowed her to pursue her music passion - she plays with Orchestra Wellington and the love of music is shared with her family - her husband and two daughters have performed together in a string quartet. Rupa is also a writer - completing her MA in creative writing at Victoria University's International Institute of Modern Letters in 2014 - she published her debut short story collection Prophecies in 2019 and was most recently included in A Clear Dawn, an anthology of Asian writing in New Zealand with her story The Two Aunties.