Land row: HC stays VBU eviction order against Amartya Sen

MP | 4 May 2023 | Kolkata: The Calcutta High Court on Thursday put a stay on the eviction notice served to Nobel laureate Amartya Sen by the Visva Bharati University (VBU) authorities in the ongoing land dispute case. A single-judge bench of Justice Bibhas Ranjan De put a stay on the eviction notice issued by the VBU authorities. 

It was ordered that unless an ongoing case at a district court at Suri in Birbhum is settled, the university authorities cannot take any action over the disputed 13 decimals of land. The hearing in the matter at the district court is scheduled on May 10. Following the eviction notice from the VBU, Sen had moved the Calcutta High Court appealing against the notice that asked him to vacate the 13 decimal of and at his Santiniketan residence by May 6. 

VBU had alleged that the portion of the land concerned is under illegal occupation by Sen. Sen, in his petition, argued that in October 1943, the then general secretary of VBU had given the 1.38 acre of land to his family on a lease for 99 years. His father later built their Santiniketan home ‘Pratichi’. 

The economist had earlier moved a court in Suri against the eviction notice and the court had set May 15 as the date for hearing. Earlier, fearing an eviction drive by the authorities of the university against Sen, his counsel had filed a petition, following which an executive magistrate at Bolpur had ordered police intervention to maintain peace. Sen had also applied for mutation of his land at the Bolpur BLRO office. 

The district magistrate of Birbhum, Bidhan Ray said that there should not be any further confusion over the piece of land since it has been mutated in Amartya Sen’s name. The land was earlier under his father’s name Ashutosh Sen. 

Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had come out in support of Sen and had handed over to him the land-related documents which she said revealed that Sen did not encroach upon any additional land as alleged by the university. 

https://www.millenniumpost.in/bengal/land-row-hc-stays-vbu-eviction-order-against-amartya-sen-517407