Members of Bengal’s civil society have condemned Visva-Bharati’s attempts to evict Amartya Sen from a part of the land at his Santiniketan home, Pratichi, and wondered at Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s silence at the Nobel laureate’s “humiliation”.

The Prime Minister is the chancellor of Visva-Bharati, a central university.

Over 120 academics, authors, poets, performing artistes and civil society members have signed an open letter under the banner of two Left-leaning cultural outfits, the Paschim Banga Ganatantrik Lekhak Shilpi Sangha and the Bharatiya Gananatya Sangha.

“The long silence of the Prime Minister and chancellor of Visva-Bharati on the issue has surprised us,” the letter, released late on Friday, reads.

A copy of the letter, written in Bengali, will be translated into English and sent toModi.

“The way Visva-Bharati has been behaving with the world-famous economist, philosopher and Nobel laureate Amartya Sen for the past few months is completely unintelligible and condemnable.... Visva-Bharati is now ready to evict him from his ancestral home in Santiniketan.

“This incident has shamed us not only before the people of Bengal and our country but also before the world. We condemn the humiliation being meted out to Amartya Sen and ask Visva-Bharati authorities to refrain from such acts.”

The signatories include former Rabindra Bharati VCs Pabitra Sarkar and Subhankar Chakraborty; actors Biplab Chattopadhyay, Sabyasachi Chakraborty, Paran Bandopadhyay and Badshah Moitra; film directors Anik Dutta and Kamaleswar Mukherjee; music composer Debojyoti Mishra; theatre personalities Ashok Mukhopadhyay, Chandan Sen and Meghnad Bhattacharya; and theatre critic Samik Bandopadhyay.

“We want the Prime Minister to clear his stand as Visva-Bharati chancellor at a time when the varsity’s vice-chancellor is mounting continuous attacks on a person of Amartya Sen’s stature in connection with a dispute over mere 13 decimals (0.13 acres) of land,” Sarkar, president of the Lekhak Shilpi Sangha, a forum of writers and artistes, said.

“It sends out a message to the world that we are incapable of honouring even someone who is a Nobel laureate and Bharat Ratna.”

He added: “The Prime Minister should clarify what the varsity plans to do with mere 13 decimals of land.”

The letter comes two days after Visva-Bharati authorities issued an order threatening the use of force to evict Sen from the stretch if he does not vacate it within a May 6 deadline.

Visva-Bharati had in January sent three letters to Sen asking him to hand over the 13 decimals that it claimed he was occupying without authorisation in addition to the 125 decimals leased to his family.

Chief minister Mamata Banerjee met the economist in Santiniketan in January and handed over land documents that she said showed that the entire 138 decimals belonged to the Sen family.

Even after the rights to the entire 138 decimals were recorded in Sen’s name by the state land department, Visva-Bharati initiated a legal process to evict him from the stretch. On April 19, it issued the eviction order.

The court of the executive magistrate of Bolpur has ordered status quo on the Pratichi plot, but a source said that Visva-Bharati was considering moving a higher court against the injunction.