Nobel laureate Amartya Sen on Wednesday said the results of the Lok Sabha elections had shown that India was not a Hindu rashtra.

Speaking exclusively to ABP Ananda on his arrival from the US on Wednesday night, the economist said: "That India is not a Hindu rashtra has been reflected in the opinion of Indian voters."

Sen, who reached his Santiniketan home late in the night, was responding to an observation that the country had got a leader of the Opposition after a decade.

Asked for his view on Narendra Modi becoming Prime Minister for a third term and that he was having to depend on allies for the first time, Sen said: "What has happened in the past is also happening now, it is imprisoning a few people. The gap between the poor and the rich has widened further. All these should stop. The political point of view has to be liberal. India is a secular nation. It would not be expedient to convert it into a Hindu nation."