Trinamul national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee on Saturday said Visva-Bharati has accused Nobel laureate Amartya Sen of occupying land without authorisation mainly because of the economist’s remarks on Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee.

“The main reason behind the vitriolic attack on Amartya Sen is he ultimately praised Mamata Banerjee. As he praised Mamata Banerjee, the 1.5 acres of land became 100 acres... If he did not praise Mamata Banerjee and if he had glorified BJP, the picture would have been different. It is very shameful and unfortunate the way an attack on a person like Amartya Sen was made. It is painful for all of us “ Abhishek said on the sidelines of an administrative review meeting in his constituency, Diamond Harbour, on Saturday.

“Bengal did not bow its head in the past and it would never do so. If they think that they would attack Amartya Sen, common individuals of Bengal and Mamata Banerjee following the direction of Delhi, the people of Bengal would give them a suitable reply again,” he added, making it clear that the ruling establishment would back the economist.

Visva-Bharati has sent two letters to Sen, accusing him of unauthorised occupation of 13-decimal land on the campus and asking him to “hand it over” at the earliest.

Several senior faculty members at the varsity had felt that the varsity administration picked on Sen, a fierce critic of the Narendra Modi government, to harass him and please the political bosses in Delhi.

On Saturday, Abhishek found another motive behind the attacks on Sen while referring to the economist’s recent comments in an interview to PTI where he said that Mamata clearly has the ability to be the Prime Minister.

“She clearly has the ability (to be the PM),” Sen had said.

The economist had added: “On the other hand, it has not yet been established that Mamata can pull the forces of public dismay against the BJP in an integrated way to make it possible for her to have the leadership to put an end to the fractionalisation in India.”

A Trinamul source said that Mamata, who is scheduled to be in Birbhum from January 30, is likely to meet Sen.