Abhijit Banerjee (Nobel Winner) Age, Wife, Family, Biography & More
Abhijit Banerjee (Nobel Winner) Age, Wife, Family, Biography & More
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Wife: Esther Duflo
Nationality: American
Age: 64 Years
| Bio/Wiki | |
|---|---|
| Full Name | Abhijit Vinayak Banerjee |
| Nickname | Jhima |
| Profession | Economist |
| Famous For | Winning the 2019 Nobel Prize in Economics |
| Physical Stats & More | |
| Height (approx.) | in centimeters**- 178 cm** in meters**- 1.78 m** in feet inches**- 5’ 10”** |
| Eye Colour | Black |
| Hair Colour | Salt & Pepper |
| Economist | |
| Field | Development Economics |
| Doctoral Advisor | Eric Maskin |
| Doctoral Student(s) | • Esther Duflo • Dean Karlan • Benjamin Jones |
| Doctoral Thesis | "Essays in Information Economics" |
| Popular Books | • Volatility And Growth (2005; Oxford University Press) • Making Aid Work (2005; MIT Press) • Understanding Poverty (2006; Oxford University Press) • Poor Economics: A Radical Rethinking of the Way to Fight Global Poverty (2011) • Handbook of Field Experiments, Volume 1 & 2 (2017) • A Short History of Poverty Measurements (2019) |
| Awards, Fellowships, Honours | • IRIS Scholar, 1993 • Institute for Policy Reform Junior Fellow, 1993 • Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellow, 1994-96 • National Science Foundation Grant, 1995-98 • Fellow of the Econometric Society, 1996 • MacArthur Foundation Grant under the Costs of Inequality Project, 1996-2002 • “Creativity Extension” of National Science Foundation Grant 1998-2000 • Guggenheim Fellow, 2000 • Mahalanobis Memorial Medal, 2000, India • Malcolm Adeshesiah Award, 2001 • National Science Foundation Grant “Inequality, Growth & Trade Policy,” 2002-2006 • Distinguished Visitor, Washington University, St. Louis, 2003 • Romesh Chandra Dutt Lecturer, 2003, Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta • National Institutes on Aging Grant “Health Care and Health Status in Rajasthan, India;” sub-grant under “Economics of Aging,” 2004 - 2009 • Kuznets Lecture, 2004, Yale University • American Academy of Arts and Sciences, Fellow, 2004 • Member, Council of the Econometric Society, 2004 • IEPR Distinguished Lecture, University of Southern California, 2006 • Michael Wallerstein Award, American Political Science Association, 2006 • D. Gale Johnson Lecture, University of Chicago, 2006 • Honorary Visiting Professor, Institute of Development Studies Kolkata, 2006 • Economic Journal Lecture, 2007 • Albert Hirschman Lecture, 2007 • Honorary Consultant in PEO, Planning Commission, India, 2008 • International Research Fellow, Kiel Institute, 2008 • BBVA Foundation Frontiers of Knowledge Award for Development Cooperation, 2009 • Infosys Award in Social Sciences, 2009 • Anaya Samman, Kolkata, 2011 • Foreign Policy Magazine's Top 100 Global Thinkers 2011 • Sherar Shera Bengali (Best of the Best Bengali) 2012 • Gabarron International Award for Economics, 2013 • The Albert O. Hirschman Prize (The Social Science Research Council), 2014 • Honorary Doctoral degree, KU Leuven, 2014 • Bernhard Harms Prize (Kiel Institute for the World Economy), 2014 • Sanjaya Lall Visiting Professor at University of Oxford, Trinity Term 2015 • Amlan Dutta Lecture, University of Kolkata, 2018 • Tanner Lecture on Human Values, University of Oxford, 2018 • Jean Jacques Laffont Lecture, AFSE, 2018 • Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, 2019 |
| Personal Life | |
| Date of Birth | 21 February 1961 (Tuesday) |
| Age (as of 2025) | 64 Years |
| Birthplace | Kolkata, India |
| Zodiac sign | Pisces |
| Nationality | American |
| Hometown | Kolkata, India |
| School | South Point School, Kolkata |
| College/University | • Presidency College, Calcutta • Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi • Harvard University • Massachusetts Institute of Technology |
| Educational Qualification(s) | • B.S. degree in economics from Presidency College, Calcutta, in 1981 • M.A. in economics from Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi, in 1983 • Ph.D. in economics from Harvard in 1988 |
| Religion | Not Known |
| Ethnicity | Bengali Indian |
| Hobbies | Cooking, Listening to Classical Music, Playing Table Tennis |
| Controversy | While sharing an incident of his student life at the JNU, he told the Hindustan Times in 2016 that in 1983, he and his friends were kept in Tihar jail for 10 days and were beaten up for "gheraoing the vice-chancellor in his house for the umpteenth time" for expelling the president of the student union. |
| Food Habit | Non-Vegetarian |
| Relationships & More ADVERTISEMENT |
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| Marital Status | Married |
| Affairs/Girlfriends | • Arundhati Tuli Banerjee • Esther Duflo |
| Marriage Date | Year, 2015 (with Esther Duflo) |
| Family | |
| Wife/Spouse | First Wife- Arundhati Tuli Banerjee (a lecturer of literature at MIT)  Second Wife- Esther Duflo (a French Nobel Prize winning economist)  |
| Children | Son- Kabir Banerjee (from Arundhati Tuli Banerjee- born 20 February 1991; died around March, 2016)  Daughter- Not Known Note: He has a baby with his second wife, Esther Duflo. The baby was born in 2012. |
| Parents | Father- Dipak Banerjee (a professor and the head of the Department of Economics at Presidency College, Calcutta)  Mother- Nirmala Banerjee (a professor of economics at the Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta)  |
| Siblings | Brother- Aniruddha (younger; lives in Gurugram) Sister- None |
| Favourite Things | |
| Favourite Dessert | Bengali Sandesh adorned with rose petal |
| Favourite Food | Exotic Lucknow Style Kebabs |
| Favourite Sports | Cricket, Table Tennis |
Some Lesser Known Facts About Abhijit Banerjee
Abhijit Banerjee is a prominent Indian American economist who won the 2019 Nobel Prize in Economics.
He was born into a family of Economists to Dipak Banerjee and Nirmala Banerjee. Professor Dipak Banerjee headed the Department of Economics at Presidency College in Calcutta; while Nirmala Banerjee was a professor of economics at the Centre for Studies in Social Sciences in Calcutta.
Abhijit spent his childhood at a house on Mahanirban Road in Kolkata playing with poor kids from a slum near his home.
His family shares a close bond with Nobel laureate Amartya Sen who has mentored Abhijit since he was two years old.
After completing his schooling from Calcutta’s South Point School, he attended Calcutta’s Presidency College, where he pursued his B.S. degree in economics.
Before attending Presidency College, he got himself enrolled at the reputable Indian Statistical Institute (ISI); as he loved Mathematics but a week into the curriculum, he quit the institute and took up economics at Presidency College.
After graduating from Presidency College, he got himself enrolled at the Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi, where he did his M.A. in economics.Â
Later, Mr. Banerjee went on to obtain a Ph.D. in economics at Harvard.
After his Ph.D., he taught at many prestigious institutions including Harvard University and Princeton University. Thereafter, he became the Ford Foundation International Professor of Economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
While teaching at MIT, he got married to Dr. Arundhati Tuli Banerjee, who was a lecturer of literature at MIT; the couple went on to have a son together named Kabir. Abhijit and Arundhati grew up together in Kolkata. However, their marriage couldn’t last long, and they divorced.
His son, Kabir attended CRLS in 2007, Buxton School in 2009, MIT in 2014, and UCL for educational studies; however, in a tragic incident, he died around March 2016. On 28 March 2016, a memorial service was held in Kabir’s honor at MIT Chapel.
In 2015, Abhijit Banerjee got married to one of his doctoral students and his co-researcher, Esther Duflo. He was a joint supervisor of Esther’s Ph.D. in economics at MIT in 1999. Abhijit was still married to his first wife, Arundhati Tuli Banerjee when he had a child with Esther.
Abhijit Banerjee With Esther Duflo
Abhijit Banerjee’s work is mainly focused on development economics, and he is best known for proposing field experiments as an important methodology to discover causal relationships in economics.
Abhijit Banerjee Doing a Field Experiment in India
In 2013, the then United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon appointed Mr. Banerjee to a panel of experts tasked with updating the Millennium Development Goals.
On 14 October 2019, Abhijit Banerjee was awarded the Nobel Prize in Economics, together with his wife Esther Duflo and Michael Kremer (an American economist), for their work alleviating global poverty.
Abhijit Banerjee’s Name Displayed as the 2019 Nobel Prize Winner in Economics
After his Nobel win, his mother revealed many facest of his life, like he is a brilliant student who never ranked first in school, a bits-and-pieces sportsman, and an ace cook. She said that she got the news about Abhijit’s Nobel win through her younger son, Aniruddha, who lives in Gurugram. She lives in a three-BHK apartment on Ballygunge Circular Road in Kolkata.
Abhijit is very fond of classical music and spends hours listening to his favourite genre of music.
He is also a sports enthusiast and loves to play Cricket and Table Tennis. He is a member of the Tollygunge Club in Kolkata, where he visits whenever in Kolkata, mostly to play Table Tennis.
According to his mother, Nirmala, Abhijit is an ace cook and has picked up the skills since he was very young. He is an expert in Marathi and Bengali dishes and often cooks for his mother and his friends.
Abhijit’s friends describe him as the one who takes centre stage among their gang of 10 school friends. During their school days, they would often hang out at the Dhakuria Lake in Kolkata; their favourite hang out spot.
Nirmala Sitharaman and Abhijit Banerjee are college-time friends; she was doing her M.Phil in JNU when Banerjee completed his MA.
After his name was linked with the NYAY scheme of the Congress party, Abhijit Banerjee denied his involvement in designing the guaranteed minimum income scheme, NYAY, promised by the Congress in the run-up to the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. He said,
My role in all of that was not to design the scheme but provide the information that you could use to make choices.”
On 11 December 2019, he donned Indian attire to receive the Nobel Prize.
Abhijit Banerjee receiving the Nobel Prize
Here’s an interesting video about Abhijit Banerjee’s video:
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