Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus blames banks for poverty

Thrissur: Bangladeshi Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus has blamed the banks for perpetuating poverty by ignoring the needs of the lower strata of society and lending huge sums to the rich.  “To effectively address the issue of poverty, separate banks and lending policies should be created for the poor,” said Mr Yunus while addressing an event organized by EASF Small Finance Bank held here on Monday.

Mr Yunus, social entrepreneur, banker and  economist,  had won the  Nobel Peace Prize  in 2006 for pioneering  small credit banking and micro finance in Bangladesh which helped millions of  marginalized families to be part of the mainstream.  He  said that all human beings have creativity and added their qualities need to be fully utilized.

“For a fresh change, fresh polices are needed. Clinging on to old polices will lead us to only  old results. The issues across the world are multi-faceted and a solution can be found in a phased manner. The banks and the government should  take the poor into confidence. The youth instead of waiting for the government to create jobs fshould  look for entrepreneurship. They are not able to create jobs for themselves because of the wrong educational polices,”  Mr Yusuf added