KOLKATA: The war of words between economist Amartya Sen and Visva-Bharati authorities continues, with the Nobel Laureate on Monday writing to V-B vice-chancellor Bidyut Chakraborty and asking him to immediately withdraw the false allegation that a plot of land owned by the university is unlawfully occupied by him.
The row erupted last month when V-B officials said the university had written to the Bengal government alleging that dozens of land parcels owned by it were wrongfully recorded in the names of private parties, including Sen’s. The economist’s lawyer, R L Auddy of Sandersons & Morgans, sent a notice to V-B to withdraw the accusation. But the university not only refused to stand down, on Saturday it demanded the Bengal government measure the plot of land on which Pratichi, Sen’s house in Santiniketan, stands to resolve the issue.
‘Crude attempt at harassment’
Amartya Sen’s letter to the vice-chancellor on Monday follows the alleged threat of legal action against him by V-B’s officiating registrar over the issue.
Pointing out that the V-B authorities had not been able to provide any justification for the astonishing allegation, Sen termed as “hugely mischievous” the request to the Bengal government to measure the area of Pratichi to compare with the longterm lease of land taken by his father from V-B, and university officiating registrar Ashok Mahato’s threat of legal action if there is any additional land occupied by him .
“This sudden abuse of an 80-year-old document is clearly a crude attempt at harassment or worse. Among other errors it ignores the big fact, which I have stated many times (even in the context of this dispute), that a substantial amount of free-hold land was purchased by my father (in the market -- not from Visva-Bharati) to add to our homestead (with records of purchase registered under Mouza-Surul), on which khajna and panchayat taxes are paid by me yearly,” he wrote.
The economist further went on to express his tiredness at the VC’s deceptions, including his insistence that Sen had made a telephone call to him from Santiniketan in June 2019 and that he had introduced himself as Bharat-Ratna when he was abroad the entire month and had come to India only in July that year.
“Rather than inventing new falsities and adding to their culpability, V-B should withdraw the false allegations made by them, as my lawyer has asked,” Sen wrote.
Chief minister Mamata Banerjee and several prominent intellectuals of the state have expressed support to the economist on the row.