Bangladesh’s top court has declared Nobel laureate and microfinance pioneer Muhammad Yunus to provide money more than US$1 million (S$1.3 million) in taxes on a US$7 million donation made to three charitable trusts, lawyers said Monday. Professor Yunus, 83, is credited with helping millions to survive out of poverty with his developing micro-credit bank, but he has been in conflict with Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, who has said he is “sucking blood” from the poor. He was awarded the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize for his work glorifying economic growth.
“The Supreme Court… denied our petition,” Prof Yunus’ lawyer Sarder Jinnat Ali told AFP. The court, which endorsed a decision by a lower court, ruled on Sunday that Prof Yunus must pay as the law does not help tax immunity for donations to trusts. Prof Yunus had provided 767 million taka (S$9.4 million) to the Professor Muhammad Yunus Trust, the Yunus Family Trust and the Yunus Centre between 2011 and 2014. The court ordered that he pay a total tax bill of 150 million taka, 30 million taka of which he has already paid. Prof Yunus has been credited with supporting to remove destructive poverty in Bangladesh by giving microfinance loans to tens of millions of rural women through Grameen Bank, which he discovered in the 1980s