Grameen Bank : The Struggle Of Muhammad Yunnus

A young professor of Economics seeing the devastating effects of 1974 famine came out of his classroom in searching the way out for the vulnerable rural poor, stepped into the village in the vicinity of his university. Interacting with landless have-nots of that village day after day, he realized that a tiny capital can enable them to earn their livelihood. He tried to help them by taking them to the doors of banks but banks refused to consider them as credit-worthy. He did not give up, rather he launched a life-long struggle for establishment of collateral-free institutional credit right. In the course of this struggle he moved from his university to remote villages at all the corners of the country. The vested quarters obstructed, tried to frustrate, termed it madness, but could not block its success. Grameen Bank emerged as the Bank of Poor. He is named as the Banker to the Poor. His novel work established the Grameen Bank and innovated the concept of micro-credit and social business. His innovation spread all over the world. The Grameen Bank become a unique model for fighting out poverty in all continents of the world. His work brought admiration at home and abroad, with so much of awards, prizes and honours that no individual scholar got during lifetime. In 2006 he and his creation Grameen Bank won the most coveted Nobel Peace Prize. Bangladesh burst out with joy and buoyed up with glory. But his struggle never ended. Since 2009 he has been subject of a nonstop conspiracy at his homeland for which he brought both pride and honour. Multifaceted harassments followed against him and his organization_ Grameen Bank. He has been removed from Grameen Bank, the bank is termed as a public bank, and management policy is changed by amending its law. He and his bank are thus thrown into another difficult struggle. A struggle that continues for long many years !!!