"The dark side of Grameen Bank"

The backlash against microcredit grows.

A commenter on this France 24 story calls the Grameen Bank mafia.

But the situation is far from rosy in Kalihati, one of the first Bangladeshi villages to benefit from Grameen’s low interest credit scheme. The villagers here who have taken a loan are unable to reimburse their credit, and claim to be harassed by Grameen Bank representatives. Korshed Alom, a former debt collector, was put into early retirement for having questioned the Grameen Bank’s methods: “Their technique is to scare borrowers and insult them. We tell them to sell their clothes, that they have no other choice. I’m not proud of myself, but several times, I had even been obliged to say ‘sell your children.’”

The Bank’s representatives choose not to respond to these accusations. It is impossible to obtain an interview with Mohammed Yunus, and the Grameen Bank headquarters are off-limits for journalists who are too curious.

In the accompanying video, an angry villager tells a Grameen representative, "You're not helping us. You're killing us."