Banker to the Poor: Micro-lending and the Battle Against World Poverty

by Muhammad Yunus

Murshida was born into a poor family of eight children. Neither her father nor grandfather owned any farmland. At fifteen she was married to a man from a nearby village who worked as an unskilled laborer in a factory. The first few years of the marriage went relatively well, but things turned sour when Murshida began having children. Just as their family expenses went up, her husband started bringing home less and less money. Finally it became clear that he was a compulsive gambler. During the 1974 famine, he was given a company bonus of 1,800 taka. He lost it all gambling. When Murshida complained, her husband beat her. To earn some extra money, Murshida took up spinning raw cotton into yarn. She worked on contract for other people and was paid very little, sometimes no more than a handful of broken rice. Still, the work prevented her from starving. She considered other options—working as a domestic servant for a rich family or begging. But what would happen to her children? One day Murshida’s husband came home after a week’s absence and complained that there was not enough food for him. Murshida had cooked up something modest and had not eaten the entire day. Angry, her husband beat her and then left, saying he would return later in the morning. That day there was a thunderstorm, and as her husband had sold the roof of their house to pay gambling debts, Murshida and her three children were soaked. At that moment Murshida decided that something had to change. When her hus...