Writing in response to a critique on the Grameen Bank by a Wall Street Journal, Mohammed Yunus argued the newspaper had missed an opportunity. He wrote that while he was happy for the endorsement to micro-credit, he thought they had missed the chance to call attention to its ability to empower the poor, particularly women, in all cultures and economies of the world. “It is cost-effective, sustainable and works in a business-way. It gives a poor person a chance to take destiny in his/her own hands and get out of poverty with his/her own efforts. The world, which has committed itself to halve the number of poor people by 2015, will find micro-credit a powerful tool in its tool box.”

Professor Yunus could not understand how anybody could miss such a big story —here were women, ready to borrow and repay money. Between delays by floods, and other co-variant risks, in the end it did always come back. Defining such conventional views on banking in a dynamic manner, Grameen Bank went on to lend $3.5 billion, and recover most of it ($3.2 billion) without any collateral. The mantra: a group of women, who would decide who had the ability to borrow.

At any given point, Grameen Bank has 20 per cent of the loan outstanding as deposits in its banks. Borne out equally by self-help groups in India —here, the figure is as high as 50 per cent.

What do we make of this PhD in economics from Vanderbilt University who decided to quit his teaching job and start lending in Chittagong? Sent by my economics department in Bath, I meet him almost 10 years ago in London. I was struck by his determined vision. How, for instance, he set up 2,000 branches across Bangladesh, fighting the government and the unions, at a time when heavily subsidised state-run institutions were the order of the day.

... contd.