AMARTYA KUMAR SEN - greatest intellectuals and economists of modern India .

AMARTYA KUMAR SEN - greatest intellectuals and economists of modern India .

Born     :  3 November 1933 at Shantiniketan, West Bengal, British India . 

Spouse(s) : Nabaneeta Dev Sen (1958 - 1976) ; Eva Colorni (1978 - 1985) ; Emma Rothschild

Field     : "Development economics" , "Social Welfare" ,"Poverty and Famines" etc. 

Awards : "Nobel prize in economic(1998)" , "Bharat Ratna(1999)" ,  "National Humanities Medal(2012)" , "Johan Skytte Prize in Political Science (2017)", "received over 90 honorary degrees from universities around the world."

Early Childhood And Education 

Amartya Kumar Sen was born on 3rd November 1933 in a Hindu Family at Shantiniketan , West Bengal , British India . His father Ashutosh Sen was Professor of Chemistry at Dhaka University, Development Commissioner in Delhi and then Chairman of the West Bengal Public Service Commission. He moved with his family to West Bengal in 1945. Sen's mother Amita Sen was the daughter of Kshiti Mohan Sen, the eminent Sanskritist and scholar of ancient and medieval India, who was a close associate of Rabindranath Tagore. K.M. Sen served as the second Vice Chancellor of Visva Bharati University from 1953 to 1954.

He received his initial education at Patha Bhavana in Shantiniketan , where he completed his school education . In 1951 , He went to Presidency College , Calcutta where he earned a B.A. in Economics . In his early childhood he was exposed to the plight of the poor . the sight of people dying during famine shocked him . It was perhaps , shocking experience that made him study the economic mechanism underlying famines and poverty . While at presidency Sen was diagnosed with Oral Cancer , and given a 15% chance of living five years . With radiant treatment , he survived . Sen first studied in India before moving to Trinity College , Cambridge , where he earned a second B.A. in economics in 1956 and then a Ph.D. in 1959 , Sen was elected to a Prize Fellowship at Trinity College , where he takes a decision to study Philosophy .   

Career : 

Sen began his career both as a teacher and a research scholar in the economics , Jadavpur University as a professor of economic in 1956 . He has taught economics at Calcutta , Delhi school of Economics (1963 - 1971) , Oxford , Harvard and was Master of Trinity College , Cambridge , M.I.T at United States , between 1997 and 2004. He continously teaching at 2015. 

During this times Sen was a Companion of distinguished economist like Man Mohan Singh , K.N.Raj and Jadish Bhagwati this period considered to be golden period in history of DSE . 

Work : 

Amartya Kumar Sen is a economist best Known for his work on Famine , Human Development theory , welfare Economics , and the underlying causes of Poverty and Hunger . hen the World was talking of free market economy , Prof. Sen emphasised the need for giving a human face to development. Amartya Sen is one of those Few Economist who talk of political economy of hunger.

Sen's best - known work is Poverty and Famines : An Essay on Entitlement and Deprivation , in Which he established that "Famines occurs not from a lack of food , but from inequalities built into mechanisms for distributing food". In addition to his important work on the causes of famines, Sen's work in the feild of development economics has considerable influence in the formulation of the Human Development Report , published by the United Nations Development Program . the HDI ranks countries on  a variety of economic and social indicators . Amartya Sen's other Works are - "Collective Choice and Social Welfare" (1970), which addressed problems related to individual rights (including formulation of the liberal paradox), justice and equity, majority rule, and the availability of information about individual conditions, inspired researchers to turn their attention to issues of basic welfare.

"Development as Freedom", Sen outlines five specific types of freedoms: political freedoms, economic facilities, social opportunities, transparency guarantees, and protective security. Political freedoms refer to the ability of the people to have a voice in government and to be able to scrutinize the authorities. Economic facilities concern both the resources within the market and the market mechanism itself. Any focus on income and wealth in the country would serve to increase the economic facilities for the people. Social opportunities deal with the establishments that provide benefits like healthcare or education for the populace, allowing individuals to live better lives. Transparency guarantees allow individuals to interact with some degree of trust and knowledge of the interaction. Protective security is the system of social safety nets that prevent a group affected by poverty being subjected to terrible misery .

"Povert and Famines" ,  etc 

Sen has been called "the Conscience of the profession" and "the Mother Teresa of Economics" for his work on famine, human development theory, welfare economics, the underlying mechanisms of poverty, gender inequality, and political liberalism. However, he denies the comparison to Mother Teresa, saying that he has never tried to follow a lifestyle of dedicated self-sacrifice. Amartya Sen also added his voice to the campaign against the anti-gay Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code. Sen is more determined about his old obsessions like literacy , basis health care and gender equity specifically in India and Bangladesh . He has setup the Pratichi Trust , with a part of the prize money , to take forward his work. 

Personal life : 

Sen has been married three times.

His first wife was Nabaneeta Dev Sen, an Indian writer and scholar, with whom he had two daughters: Antara, a journalist and publisher, and Nandana, a Bollywood actress. Their marriage broke up shortly after they moved to London in 1971.

In 1978 Sen married Eva Colorni, an Italian economist, . The couple had two children, a daughter Indrani, who is a journalist in New York, and a son Kabir, a hip hop artist, MC, and music teacher at Shady Hill School. Eva died of cancer in 1985. In 1991,

Sen married Emma Georgina Rothschild, who serves as the Jeremy and Jane Knowles Professor of History at Harvard University.