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Not Even a Nobel Laureate

by Syed Muhammad Hussain
***JL &h£!Jn&gicito#Mabel Ptiia^jUier^d in d spectacle oftuthultuous ot'ations, congratulations and a general media blast on Amartya Sen. Especially, some are Reinventing him in terms of his closeness to them in academic institutions abroad. There is certainly nothing wrong in these; in fact these may atone for the obvious neglect that Professor Sen had endured over all these years in not being recognised as a son to be proud of in his own home.***
NOTHING succeeds like success, especially when the success is in the form of a Nobel Prize. Professor Amartya Sen again proved this truism, nay, the truth. It may be recalled that Professor Sen was suddenly being discovered by all and sundry in India and Bangladesh. His name, of course, has been a highly respected one. both in the academic circles, and beyond. His major contributions in regard to a new perspective on famine and its causes, poverty of nations and its new measurement framework and generally, on the welfare economics, the so-called ‘human face' of economics, were all there for a considerable period of pre-No-bel Prize time. But then we all would not recognise his genius in terms not only of the academic excellence of his postulates. but also of the practical import of his recommendations and observations in our planning framework. I do not recall to have seen any mention anywhere of Professor Sen's thesis in the media or in any of our planning documents. And deepest apologies, if I had missed any such reference to his paradigms with our eminent band of economists having been engaged in the task of preparing the Five-Year Plans since Bangladesh's initial years. Nor any of the policies relating to
poverty eradication in our country contained any suggestion or reference, other than those spinned by our very own intellectuals.
The magic of Noble Prize ushered in a spectacle of tumultuous ovations, congratulations and a general media blast on Amartya Sen. Especially, some are reinventing him in terms of his closeness to them in academic institutions abroad. There is certainly nothing wrong in these; In fact these may atone for the obvious neglect that Professor Sen had endured over all these years in not being recognised as a son to be proud of in his own home. His golden, and most productive, years apparently have been spent in Britain and the United' States. We all gushed out to lionise him. which is all very well. Professor Amartya Sen. if nothing else, has the British polish in his remake ‘I think it would be pompous and arrogant to think it is a great credit to Bengal. Bangladesh or India’ — a claim we had all made in a great hurry without waiting for him to say so. if he did indeed think so. Apparently, he did not and our very limited knowledge of the English language makes us believe that this is a polite way of refusal to accept such accolades. This perhaps brings back 85-year old memories of Rabindranath Tagore’s refusal
to accept the felicitations by the Indian intellectuals and literary figures on his winning the Nobel Prize for Literature. Both in essence reject a reflected glory as something is ingrained in our psyche that unless the West gives a medal, our own ovation to our own illustrious sons and daughters is not to be.
Going by the recent performance of the last year's Nobel Prize winners in Economics, Nobel Prize could be a yardstick of great performances, in the past, especially in theoretical terms, it is certainly not a guarantee for the Laureate s continued brilliance in future. In fact, the two were proved wrong in their risk theories, and while they won the prize money they lost heavily on their own investments in stock markets. I hasten to add that Professor Sen. of course, is on an entirely different plane. Even then, if I dare say now in this blitz of high compliments on his work, to postulate that famines do not happen in democracies is somewhat simplistic. India herself suffers from famine conditions in various regions from time to time, despite her well-established democratic credentials. Poverty, if not outright famine, is known to exist in some areas of the United States. Italy. Spain. Portugal and elsewhere. If I am not too mistaken, famine was not visit-
ing too frequently the old socialist economies as such. Mo-rocco, a monarchy, has not suffered the curse of famine. Whether it would be an acceptable proposition that it is the lack of distribution of food grains globally, and not the crop failures in particular countries, which cause the famines, we should ponder. It is possible theoretically to assume so. but the fact of the matter is obviously the abilities of each nation to have adequate supplies, internal production as well as imports, and perhaps prevention of a steep shortfall in either and in the total availability. as well as its effective dispersal, that would ensure that famine-like conditions do not emerge.
It is interesting to note that Amartya Sen and his work have gone back into the shadows and our professional economists and others have moved onto greener pastures. Is it because the honourary PhD from Dhaka University had taken the shine off the Nobel Laureate? Our attention to his work was so short-lived as to give an impression that we would rather bask in his glory than delve deep into his wisdom!
The writer is a retired Secretary to the Government and Jormer Ambassador of Bangladesh to Morocco. Nepal and Zimbabwe.