◐ Shell
reader mode source ↗
Jump to content
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Indian politician (1898–1993)

Binay Ranjan Sen
Sen as ambassador to Yugoslavia
Director-General of the Food and Agriculture Organization
In office
November 1956  December 1967
Preceded byPhilip V. Cardon
Succeeded byAddeke Hendrik Boerma
3rd Ambassador of India to Japan
In office
17 February 1955  September 1956
Prime MinisterJawaharlal Nehru
Preceded byM. A. Rauf
Succeeded byChandra Shekhar Jha
4th Ambassador of India to the United States
In office
1951–1952
Prime MinisterJawaharlal Nehru
Preceded byVijaya Lakshmi Pandit
Succeeded byGaganvihari Lallubhai Mehta
Personal details
Born(1898-01-01)1 January 1898
Dibrugarh, North-East Frontier, India
(present-day Assam)
Died12 June 1993(1993-06-12) (aged 95)
Calcutta, West Bengal, India
(present-day Kolkata)
Alma materScottish Church College (BS)
University of Oxford
OccupationCivil servant

Binay Ranjan Sen (1 January 1898 – 12 June 1993) was an Indian civil servant and diplomat. He served as director-general of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations from 1956 to 1967. He drew on his experience as relief commissioner from 1942 to 1943 during the Bengal famine of 1943 to build the FAO from a data-gathering bureaucracy into a major force against world hunger.[citation needed]

Biography

[edit]

He studied at the Scottish Church College of the University of Calcutta and subsequently at the University of Oxford.[1] Sen joined the Indian Civil Service in Bengal in 1922.[2] His work as director general of food for all India (1943–1946), for which he was appointed a Companion of the Order of the Indian Empire in 1944,[3] convinced him that hunger and malnutrition were crucial issues in the modern world.

He took his concerns to the international stage as a member of India's first delegation to the UN (1947), as Indian Ambassador to the United States, and several other countries including Italy, Yugoslavia, Japan, and Mexico. He worked on a variety of FAO projects before being named Director General in 1956. While he was the Relief Commissioner(1942–43)in Bengal during Bengal famine, his mission of preventing hunger was set. In 1960, saying half the world's population was malnourished, Sen announced the Freedom from Hunger campaign. "Hunger is neither inevitable nor irremediable," he added, "it is within our power to bring this old affliction under control."[4] This led to the 1963 World Food Congress in Washington, D.C., attended by representatives from more than 100 countries.[citation needed]

See also

[edit]

References

[edit]
  1. Sen, Asit. Glimpses of College History: The Students and the Teachers in 175th Year Commemoration Volume. Scottish Church College, April 2008. page 233.
  2. London Gazette, 3 November 1922
  3. London Gazette, 1 January 1944
  4. Lambert, Bruce (13 June 1993). "Binay Ranjan Sen is Dead at 94; Led U.N. Drive Against Hunger". The New York Times.
  • Towards a Newer World by B. R. Sen, published by Tycooly International Publishing Ltd, Dublin (ISBN 0907567274)
  • The Birth of Development: How the World Bank, Food and Agriculture Organization, and World Health Organization Changed the World, 1945-1965 by Amy L. S. Staples. Kent, OH: Kent State University Press, 2005 (ISBN 0873388496)
[edit]