A day after Nobel laureate Amartya Sen called for an alignment of non-BJP and non-communal parties for the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, the BJP and the Trinamool Congress on Sunday engaged in a war of words over the veteran economist's comments.
Sen had described the BJP as a party with “ill motives” during an event in Kolkata's Sisir Manch Auditorium on Saturday. He had called on the Left parties to join the larger opposition to present a challenge to the BJP. Sen described communalism as the “biggest threat”, arguing, “We must criticise the issues where we need to oppose the non-communal rightwing forces, but we must not take back our hands when it comes to fighting communalism, which is the biggest threat.”
On Sunday, BJP West Bengal president Dilip Ghosh described Sen as a “Marxist” who had little relevance in the present times. Ghosh declared, "Intellectuals like Sen, who had always professed Left ideology, are losing touch with reality.” The BJP leader claimed Sen had always given a “wrong direction to society; it is no surprise he is again doing the same thing”.
Reacting to the BJP's criticism of Sen, Trinamool Congress Secretary General Partha Chatterjee said, "One has to be a reader of books to acquire the right to speak on Amartya Sen."
Chatterjee described BJP supporters as people who “wield lathis at processions” who should refrain from making comments on a person of Sen's stature as they can't appreciate the words spoken by an erudite person like him."
Sen has been a consistent critic of the BJP-led Central government's policies, calling demonetisation as Prime Minister Narendra Modi's “Napoleon moment” in January 2017. Sen had also opposed Modi being projected as the prime ministerial candidate of the BJP in 2014.
(With PTI inputs)