PANAJI: Nobel Prize winner in Economics Dr Abhijit Banerjee is not only a great scholar but also a generous human being, which was evident when in 2015 he helped an alumnus from his alma mater Presidency College (now Presidency University), Kolkata to get US Green Card, which was being stalled by US authorities for a decade.
Sharing this anecdote, a fellow alumnus from Presidency College and a senior investment banker in Mumbai, Runia Sen said, “One of my college mates wanted to migrate to USA. He first applied in 2005. But the US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) authorities refused to accept his application as according to them his three years of graduation degree was not acceptable in the US, which has a four-year graduation system.”
After failing to get US Citizenship and Immigration Services approval for Green Card, he was distraught.
Finally, he mailed to all Presidency alumni settled in US, including another Nobel laureate in Economics Prof Amartya Sen and Prof Abhijit Banerjee, seeking their help.
“Of all the alumni he had written to, only Prof Banerjee responded, that too on his Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) letterhead,” Sen said.
In his letter, Prof Banerjee stated, “Three-year bachelor degrees such as those from India or the UK are routinely accepted in the US as requirement for entry to a Masters Program. In that sense, they are treated as being equivalent to the US 4-year BA/BS degrees in the USA.”
“This letter helped my college friend to get the US Citizenship and Immigration Services nod for Green Card. Soon after the news broke that Prof Banerjee was selected for 2019 Economics Nobel Prize, he was elated,” he said.
Although Sen never met Prof Abhijit Banerjee, she was taught by his economist father Late Prof Dipak Banerjee.
“Prof Dipak Banerjee used to teach us when I was doing my BCom at Presidency College in 1995. He was a senior professor and used to go into details of his subject. He was particular about his class preparation and expected the same from his students. He was a very respectable man,” she said.
She was not surprised to learn that her professor’s son excelled as an economist and became a Nobel Prize awardee.
“Late Prof Dipak Banerjee attached importance to discipline, research, preparation. His son couldn’t have been any different and the result is for everyone to see. We all feel proud being Presidency alumni,” Runia Sen added.