Amartya Sen 'touched' by Mamata Banerjee's support on land controversy

Nobel laureate Amartya Sen wrote to Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Monday, thanking her for support in the controversy over his ancestral property in the campus of the Visva Bharati University's campus in Santineketan, situated in India's West Bengal. 

The university has reportedly named the renowned economist among the squatters on its land in a list sent to India's Ministry of Education, reports the NDTV. 

Mamata Banerjee has accused the BJP of creating a controversy around the laureate as he has been a vocal critic of its government's economic policies.  

Sen's family home in Santiniketan, "Pratichi", was built by his maternal grandfather Kshitimohan Sen, a scholar and an associate of Rabindranath Tagore, who established the university a hundred years ago. 

The laureate has said the land was registered on a long-term lease that is nowhere close to expiry.

"I am not only most touched, but also very reassured that despite the busy life you have to lead, you can find time for reassuring people under attack. Your strong voice, along with your full understanding of what is going on, is, for me, a tremendous source of strength," he wrote to Banerjee.

On Friday, the Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had written to the 87-year-old. Expressing "surprise and anguish", she spoke of his deep links with Santiniketan and "nouveau invaders" raising baseless allegations.

"Some nouveau invaders in Visva Bharati have started raising surprising and baseless allegations about your familial properties... This pains me, and I want to express my solidarity with you in your battles against bigotry of majoritarians in this country, the battles that have made you an enemy of these forces of untruth," she wrote.

Mamata Banerje said, "Amartya Sen is being attacked for his views against the Union government. This is completely unacceptable. Just like I am being attacked for my political views," she told reporters.