Banker to the poor. Review on Banker To The Poor - Dr. Muhammad Yunus

BANKER TO THE POOR is autobiography-cum-story of Grameen(rural) bank founded in Bangladesh

by Mohammed Yunus who recieved Nobel prize in 2006.

Yunus was born in Chittagong(Bangladesh) in a jeweller family and had several siblings.He

had a very loving mother but later on his mother contracted psychiatric illness.He studied

in Local schools and colleges, but later on went to US to study.During that time, war started

in Bangladesh and he supported formation of Bangladesh from there, also he got married there

with Vera and had a daughter, but when he came back to Bangladesh, his wife had differences

with him on their daughter's education and they separated, he later on had a second marriage

with Afrozi and had a daughter .But the book is more or less about Grameen bank which he

founded when he saw extreme poverty in a village called Jobra which was along side his

college where he taught economics.

He started the theory of micro-credit and started giving very small amounts of money as loan

in villages.In a country like Bangladesh where women do not talk to strangers and are

dependent on males in their families for everything, he revolutionized the whole scenario and

made poor rural women economically independent which corrected other social problems too

like dowry, non-education and wife beating.

Grameen bank was replicated later on in many countries including India and US too.Also

Grameen check(cloth), grameen phone, grameen shikkha(education) and many such things were

launched later on which changed the lives of millions of people in Bangladesh and other

countries who were needy and poor but hardworking at the same time.

I am not sure if Indian grameen bank has some connection with it, if it does have, this is

news to me as I didn't know this came from Bangladesh.Also, i found another rather odd thing

in this book that despite India being very helpful in making of Bangladesh, Yunus has not

used additional words of any trace of gratitude in this book except writing that they

operated from Indian cities during crisis.Also in childhood, he was anti India and has not

explained if his views ever changed when India helped his country.May be he was too busy

explaining the story of Grameen Bank.Anyway, he did wonderful job for poor and needy.

Thanks for reading my review.