Muhammad Yunus and the Grameen bank

TOI Blog Link- Muhammad Yunus and the Grameen bank- CLICK HERE

Once in a while you hear news that’s actually good. In the world bent upon its own destruction and marked with hierarchies of money, religion, region, language and gender [just to name a few] it was heartening to see Muhammad Yunus and the Grameen bank win the Nobel prize. Being the one who doesn’t look for a pat on the back from the West- be it India’s foreign policy or the race for Oscars- I found myself take such pride in perhaps one of the most meaningful Nobel prizes. Since the list added Gorbachev, Arafat, Peres, Annan [again, just to name a few] while MK Gandhi missing from the list, the prize appeared nothing more than an annual ritual. For me, it changed yesterday with the triumph of Yunus and his Grameen bank.

The beauty of everything is the simplistic yet practical approach that Yunus and his bank uses. I was reminded of an African proverb that if you give fish to a hungry man, he’ll eat it and go hungry again; while if you teach him how to catch a fish, you’ll resolve the hunger. It has always bothered me when the rich nations go and drop food and medicine in war torn or otherwise consistently poor areas. It seemed such a bandaid approach. The way everything is structured today makes it easier for the rich to get richer while the poor wait for the charity. Now, I am not a communist, but it doesn’t take a genius to see how flawed the socio-economic structure is where people live and die hoping for a charity. And again, with religious charities tapping into the race for exploitation, it just worsens the situation [given that most conflicts are rooted in religious numbers]. The best part of the story is that Yunus has his heart and mind at the right place. The other day I was reading about first woman tourist in space- Anousheh Ansari. She has one of the most successful and incredible immigrant stories. And I was a total sucker when she appeared on Oprah and spoke so well of how all the politicians of the world should make a space trip and see how there are no geographical boundaries that divide the planet; the only home that we have in the universe. Seemed so simple and so poignant. That is until I switched to comics and cynics. The fact that she spent $20 million to learn the simple fact that boundaries- all- are manmade just seemed so disconnected. I couldn’t help but wonder how many people were going without food and medicine the very moment that she was looking at the earth and making this assumption.

Now again, I don’t believe that those who have the money should simply give it to the poor- remember that I don’t believe in charity for the sake of charity. But I can only wonder how many Grameen bank-like projects such money could have initiated. Well, for the time being I will just smile and relive the pride that Yunus has brought to the Nobel prize instead of the other way around.