Muhammad Yunus[a] (born 28 June 1940) is a Bangladeshi economist, businessman, and politician who has been serving as Chief Adviser of the Interim Government of Bangladesh since 8 August 2024.

[9][10] Following the overthrow of Sheikh Hasina, President Mohammed Shahabuddin gave Yunus a mandate to form an interim government, acceding to calls from student leaders for his appointment.

[13] The third of nine children,[14] Muhammad Yunus was born on 28 June 1940 to a Bengali Muslim family of Saudagars in the village of Bathua, by the Kaptai road at Hathazari in the Chittagong District of Bengal Presidency (now in Bangladesh).

[18][19] After his graduation, Yunus joined the Bureau of Economics at Dhaka University as a research assistant to economists Nurul Islam and Rehman Sobhan.

On 2 August 2005, in response to a petition by Bangladesh Legal Aid and Services Trust (BLAST), the High Court declared village governments illegal and unconstitutional.

[25][26][27] In 1976, during visits to the poorest households in the village of Jobra near Chittagong University, Yunus discovered that very small loans could make a disproportionate difference to a poor person.

[28] But Yunus believed that, given the chance, the poor will not need to pay high interest on the money, can keep any profits from their own labour, and hence microcredit was a viable business model.

[23] In the late 1980s, Grameen started to diversify by attending to underutilized fishing ponds and irrigation pumps like deep tube wells.

[46] In March 2016, he was appointed by United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to the High-Level Commission on Health Employment and Economic Growth, which was co-chaired by presidents François Hollande of France and Jacob Zuma of South Africa.

[56] On 3 May, however, Yunus declared that he had decided to abandon his political plans following a meeting with the head of the caretaker government, Fakhruddin Ahmed.

[66] As Chief Adviser, Yunus has pledged to continue providing humanitarian aid to Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh and support the garment industry amid disruptions caused by the unrest prior to his appointment.

[69] In February 2011, several international leaders, such as Mary Robinson, stepped up their defence of Yunus through a number of efforts, including the founding of a formal network of supporters known as "Friends of Grameen".

[70] On 15 February 2011, the Finance Minister of Bangladesh, Abul Maal Abdul Muhith, declared that Yunus should "stay away" from Grameen Bank while it is being investigated.

[84] In September 2010, Yunus criticised the IPO; in a debate with SKS founder Vikram Akula during the Clinton Global Initiative meeting,[85] he said, "Microcredit is not about exciting people to make money off the poor.

[57] In 2013, he faced a state-backed smear campaign that accused him of being un-Islamic and promoting homosexuality, after he signed a joint statement criticising the prosecution of gay people in Uganda in 2012 with three other nobel laureates.

[100] The series of trials against Yunus[101] puzzled figures worldwide, from the 8.3 million underprivileged women served by Grameen Bank to U.S. President Barack Obama.

[102][103] Vikas Bajaj wrote on 7 November 2013: The government of Bangladesh has played its trump card in its long-running campaign against Grameen Bank and its founder Muhammad Yunus.

[104]On 1 January 2024, a court in Bangladesh sentenced Yunus to a six-month prison term, along with three employees from Grameen Telecom for labor law violations.

On 9 March, Attorney General Mahbubey Alam expressed the government's attitude when he said, "Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina should have been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize".

Fakhruddin took office on 11 January 2007 and made it clear on his first day that he intended not only to arrange a free and fair election but also to clean up corruption.

[101] The Bangladesh government launched the first trial against Yunus in December 2010, alleging that in 1996 he had transferred approximately $100 million to a sister company of Grameen Bank.

The full bench of the Appellate Division headed by Chief Justice ABM Khairul Haque heard the appeal on 15 March 2011 and upheld Yunus's removal by the government.

Hasina also ordered a fresh investigation into Yunus's activities and financial transactions[132] in his later years as managing director of Grameen, but people saw the move as an attempt to destroy his image.

The Grameen Bank Act 2013 was approved at a cabinet meeting chaired by Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina[135] and was passed by parliament on 7 November 2013.

[137] The New York Times reported in August 2013: Since then, the government has started an investigation into the bank and is now planning to take over Grameen—a majority of whose shares are owned by its borrowers—and break it up into 19 regional lenders.

From modest beginnings three decades ago, Yunus has, first and foremost through Grameen Bank, developed micro-credit into an ever more important instrument in the struggle against poverty.Yunus was the first Bangladeshi to ever get a Nobel Prize.

[154] After receiving the news of the important award, Yunus announced that he would use part of his share of the $1.4 million (equivalent to $2.12 million in 2023) award money to create a company to make low-cost, high-nutrition food for the poor; while the rest would go towards establishing the Yunus Science and Technology University in his home district as well as setting up an eye hospital for the poor in Bangladesh.

[157] In a speech given at University of California, Berkeley in 2002, President Clinton described Yunus as "a man who long ago should have won the Nobel Prize [in Economics and] I'll keep saying that until they finally give it to him.

[170] In its citation, Fortune Magazine said "Yunus' idea inspired countless numbers of young people to devote themselves to social causes all over the world.

[174] Yunus received 50 honorary doctorate degrees from universities from Argentina, Australia, Bangladesh, Belgium, Canada, Costa Rica, India, Italy, Japan, Korea, Lebanon, Malaysia, Peru, Russia, South Africa, Spain, Thailand, Turkey, the UK, and the US.