KOLLAM: Expressing concern over the exploitation in the micro-financing sector, the Bangladeshi economist Muhammed Yunus urged the governments to enact separate piece of legislation and set up a regulatory mechanism for the sector.“We created micro-financing to get over poverty and not with the intention of making money, but today the idea of micro-financing has been abused by people who are lending out money to poor people to make profit,” said Yunus, the founder of Grameen Bank, at a meet-the-press programme on Tuesday. Speaking about the need for distancing the regulation of the micro-finance institution from the Central Bank of a country, Yunus said that the Central Bank had no experience in regulating the ‘banks for the poor’ as it deals only with the ‘banks for the rich.’ “Then why don’t we have a separate regulatory authority for micro-financing institutions, which will specialise in regulating the bank for the poor,” he said adding that this model was evolving in Bangladesh.On providing education loans, he said that in Bangladesh, along with providing loans for students at low interest the idea that the goal of education was not to get a job but to become entrepreneurs, was being spread. “We should change the education system which considers securing a job as the aim of education. Instead it should motivate them to become social entrepreneurs and change the world,” he said. Replying to questions he said that the government and media in Bangladesh often had a negative attitude to the activities of the Grameen Bank. “Media had raised allegations that we were charging huge interests on poor people,” he said.
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