Binay Ranjan Sen,CIE,ICS (1 January 1898,Dibrugarh, India - 12 June 1993,Calcutta, India), was an Indian diplomat and Indian Civil Service officer. He served asDirector General (1956–1967) of theUN'sFood and Agriculture Organization (FAO). He drew on his experience as relief commissioner (1942–1943) during theBengal famine of 1943 to build the FAO from a data-gathering bureaucracy into a major force against world hunger.[citation needed]
He studied at theScottish Church College of theUniversity of Calcutta and subsequently at theUniversity of Oxford.[1] Sen joined theIndian Civil Service inBengal in 1922.[2] His work as director general of food for all India (1943–1946), for which he was appointed a Companion of theOrder of the Indian Empire in 1944,[3] convinced him thathunger andmalnutrition were crucial issues in the modern world.
He took his concerns to the international stage as a member of India's first delegation to theUN (1947), asIndian Ambassador to the United States, and several other countries includingItaly,Yugoslavia,Japan, andMexico. He worked on a variety of FAO projects before being namedDirector 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 inWashington, D.C., attended by representatives from more than 100 countries.[citation needed]
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