Historic moments of Nobel Peace Prize award ceremony

I had the opportunity to travel to Europe on quite a few occasions in the past, on both personal and professional business. So, I had some ideas about their culture, tradition and advancement in different aspects of their life. Although I was scared of the shivering cold of the Scandinavian countries especially Norway situated in the extreme north of Europe, yet the thought of cold could not scare me from visiting Norway for a special reason this time. The reason was plain and simple -- witnessing Bangladesh's greatest achievement. Needless to mention, how glorious it is for a country or a nation to get a Novel Peace Prize and Bangladesh achieved it on the 35th year of its Independence. Whatever negative image we had in the world as a country of natural calamities and man-made calamities like corruption, political unrest, degradation of human values etc., this astounding success has wiped them all. The whole world watched it with great admiration, applauded and learned that we have success stories too.

One of such successes was the introduction of micro credit in Bangladesh. I have been working with the rural people as a professional for the last 25 years. So, I have watched very closely the hopes and aspirations, joys and sorrows, expectations and achievements of the people of almost all the villages of Bangladesh. I have seen how some of these people conquered poverty with indomitable courage and innovative ideas. I have seen a lot of success stories during the last two decades of my career in electronic media. I have seen how some farmers became millionaire with small investment and hard labour in agriculture. I also saw how some of these farmers became heroes by showing examples of agricultural development.

In Pabna region, there are many such farmer heroes. I have brought these heroes on the TV screen through my programme "Hridoye Mati-O-Manush". Out of them, the names of Pepe Badsha, Pias Sirajul, Moyez Dhania are mentionworthy. Besides this, fish cultivators of Mymensingh like Nurul Huq, Abul Hashem, Haji Sobhan, lemon cultivator Ibrahim Sarkar are all bright examples of success in their respective areas. Above all, who does not know the incredible stories and the names of Haripada Kapali -- the inventor of Hari Rice or of Kartik Pramanik -- the great lover of trees. These people have automatically transformed into heroes in the country.

Then, there are numerous examples of people who have changed their lot with micro-credit. In producing "Mati-O-Manush" in BTV and subsequently "Hridoye Mati-O-Manush" in Channel-i I have witnessed numerous examples of success of micro-credit scheme. Just a few months back, I met the rural housewife -- Nilufar Yasmeen of Pirojpur, Zaheda Begum of Jessore, Zakir Hossain of Tangail whose entrepreneurship impressed me immensely. While working in the villages, it was my firm belief that it is the rural people who would take Bangladesh to the peak of glory and my prediction came true and finally the Nobel Peace Prize awarded to Prof. Dr. Yunus and his Grameen Bank bears testimony to the endless success stories of the rural people in the development of the country.

No wonder, the world attention is now focused on the rural women like Taslima Begum or Aroti Rani. It is really a matter of pride. With the hope and keen interest of watching this rare event of these people who conquered poverty and thereby getting Nobel Peace Prize, I started for Oslo, the capital of Norway on 7th December 2006. My four colleagues of Channel-i namely, Aditto Shaheen, Aminul Islam, Sajjad Hossain Roni and Shahidullah Titon accompanied me. In my opinion, the day of the historic announcement of the winner of Nobel Peace Prize brought more joy and happiness to the people than the day of the Prize giving ceremony. Because, what can be more thrilling than the announcement of Nobel Peace Prize winner. On this day, the whole nation went into a festive mood.

In fact, Bangladesh has gained a new look from 13th October. The battle waged by Dr. Yunus 30 years back in 1976 from the village of Jobra, Chittagong brought him ultimate success because of his untiring efforts and meticulous planning. This success story has crossed the boundary of Bangladesh and now reached every corner of the world.

Today, this concept of micro-credit is no more confined to Bangladesh. Other countries of the world have already adopted it as a tool for poverty alleviation and economic-development. It may be mentioned here that I met Prof. Dr. Yunus in early eighties.

At that time, I was busy with my programme "Mati-O-Manush" in BTV. While making programmes on Fish Hatchery in Rangpur and Sirajgonj I had discussed with Dr. Yunus for more than once. I observed that he did not work for micro-credit only, but also equally laid stress on building up organisations on co-operative basis. It is mentionworthy that 100 years ago, another Nobel prize winner poet Rabindra Nath Tagore equally emphasized on this issue. Although, the name and fame of Dr. Yunus spread all over the world through international media during 1980-90, he was still not so familiar with the people of Bangladesh. Bangladesh media also did not focus much on him. In the early nineties, I interviewed Dr. Yunus in "Mati-O-Manush" programme on Orchid cultivation by the women. In that programme, Dr. Yunus advocated for empowerment of women. He also said that the orchid cultivation can be an ideal tool for empowerment of women. No wonder today we find that 70 lac women of the country have achieved economic emancipation by practicing the ideals of Dr. Yunus and thereby winning the world's greatest crown "Nobel Peace Prize".

Before starting for Oslo, I took a special interview of Dr. Yunus in Grameen Bank building on 1st Dec 2006. Where I asked him whether micro-credit somehow resembles the practice of "Kabuliwalas". He smartly replied, "We have not forced any person to come under micro-credit scheme, those who came willingly have been benefited". When asked whether he has any plan to join politics or form a political party, he replied that we badly need honest leadership and people's true representatives. If we can check corruption, we will automatically prosper.

In the afternoon of 8th Dec 2006, we arrived in the Carl Johan Street of Norway. I could feel the biting cold as soon as I got out of the airport. The temperature of 50 Celsius made us shiver. Carl Johan Street is a straight and famous walking street of Norway.

This road originated from the King's Palace. On one side of Carl Johan Street, there is Norwegian Parliament and open space for Ice-skating and on the other side, there are famous hotels and shopping malls. A few yards away, one can find the first underground rail station of Norway.

Every year, Nobel Peace Prize winners are put in the Grand Hotel. We stayed at the famous Norlia Hotel and Resort which is just beside the Grand Hotel. Since evening, we had been waiting by the side of Grand Hotel for the arrival of Prof. Dr. Md. Yunus and the members of Grameen Bank who would receive the Nobel Peace Prize. For security or some other reason, the Grand Hotel reception did not divulge any information about the arrival of the Nobel prize winner. At about 8:00 p.m. we came to know that Dr. Yunus would reach Oslo airport at 10:00pm (local time) and it would be 11:30pm when he would reach the hotel. It started drizzling in the evening and the temperature was 30 Celsius. We had been waiting by the side of Grand Hotel from 1:00pm by rotation and found that quite a few black Limousines were kept ready in front of the hotel to bring Dr. Yunus from the airport. All these cars left for airport at 9:15 p.m. and the security personnel at once took position in front of the gate of the Grand Hotel and put a barricade. On both sides of the barricade were the journalist and cameramen -- both local and international. From Bangladesh, we were five.

Finally, at 11:45pm the sirens of the security personnel announced the arrival of Prof. Dr. Yunus' entourage in front of the Grand Hotel. We were then chanting slogans "Long Live Bangaldesh". In the shivering cold and drizzle, Prof. Dr. Md. Yunus came forward seeing some Bangladeshies waiting for him. We exchanged greetings. Dr. Yunus also gave his instant reaction to Channel-i. With him were Afrozi Yunus, Dina Yunus and Taslima Begum -- the housewife of Chapai Nawabgonj and member of the Governing Body of the Grameen Bank. The lady looked very confident. Standing on the soil of Norway she narrated how she conquered poverty. Anyway, this was our experience of the first night in Oslo. I was busy in collecting news and sending video footage to Dhaka.

Next day, i.e., on 9th Dec 2006, a Press Conference was held at the Nobel Institute of Oslo at 1:00pm. This was a routine programme of Nobel Committee of Norway arranged every year for the Nobel Peace Prize Winner. The historic Nobel Institute carrying the memory of Alfred Nobel became crowded before 1:00pm with the pressmen of different media of the world. The Press and the TV crew of Bangladesh were also present. At the entrance of the second floor, a barricade of video camera was formed. The Pressmen were also ready. At 1:15 p.m. Prof. Dr. Md. Yunus along with Taslima Begum entered with the Director of the Nobel Institute Mr. Luenceted. Hundreds of cameras clicked. Numerous flashes of cameras continued for some time like showering of flowers. The four chairs kept there were occupied by Director Luenceted, Prof. Dr. Md. Yunus, Taslima Begum and her interpreter Dipal Barua, Dy. Director General of Grameen Bank.

After introduction by Luenceted about him and the activities of his Grameen Bank, Prof. Yunus told the pressmen the history of micro-credit originating from Jobra village in 1976, establishment of Grameen Bank in 1983 and his programme for poverty alleviation till today. He also raised the issue of social business. He said that vision for tomorrow is not aimed at development of individual or group rather this vision is universal, both social and economic which is called social business. In reply to a question by AFP relating to the recent political crisis in Bangladesh, Dr. Yunus said that "we cannot move forward if we fail to get rid of corruption. Our politician and people's representatives must be free from corruption. The leaders elected for Parliament should be honest." Referring to the popularity of micro-credit all over the world, he opined that all big banks including Swiss Bank should introduce the micro-credit system.

Taslima Begum also narrated her story. Taslima Begum belonged to the village of Dhomgor of Shibgonj Upazilla in the district of Chapai Nawabgonj. She comes from a poor family and read upto Class-V. In 1992, she became a member of Shibgonj Branch of Grameen Bank. Till today, she took loans for fifteen times. She cultivates vegetables and runs a poultry farm. She has also a mango grove on one bigha land which gives her an annual income of Tk. 25-30 thousand. She cultivates fish in the ponds which gives her Tk. 30,000/- per year. She has also purchased a three-wheeler with the loan money.

I do not know what the Pressmen of the world could get from the story of a housewife who conquered poverty, but she was nothing new to me. She was not different from any other rural housewife whose replica was very familiar to me during my interaction with thousands of rural housewives, I encountered during the last two decades. In November last Nilufar Yasmeen of Birona village of Pirojpur represented Bangladesh as the greatest innovative entrepreneur in the international micro-credit conference 2006 held in Canada. Her story was the same. Micro-credit showed the beacon of prosperity in their lives.

Every year, Oslo, the capital of Norway experience an abnormally cold weather in December which is minus 25-30 degree Celsius. This is something unbelievable for Bangladeshis. We always see the snow in TV screen only. We are not used to this sort of temperature. For the people of Oslo, this is quite normal and they are used to it. They have been experiencing this extreme cold in every December for years together. Surprisingly, this December, Oslo saw the warmest temperature in the last 50 years. It was 3 to 6 degrees Celsius which, though unbearable for us, was a pleasant surprise for the people of Norway. While walking we talked to many people of Oslo about this change. They remarked jokingly, "Well, you have won the Nobel Peace Prize this time. As you have come from a warm country, temperature here has also become warm. Actually, we have been experiencing such temperature from 10th December. While walking in the Royal Carl Johan Street, we also met a few Bangali in Oslo which has a population of six lac. We found them very excited & proud. I met a group of Bengali students of Bargen University who had come to Oslo by train a day before. Some of them also had the invitation cards for the Nobel Peace Prize Award ceremony. Of course, many of them did not have such cards. So, what? Nobel Peace Prize ceremony is something they can't afford to miss! Even if they can't witness the grand show, what is wrong to be in Oslo even in chilly winter of December to feel the warmth, excitement and pride of winning the Nobel Peace Prize?

10th December is the Death anniversary of Alfred Nobel -- that is why every year Nobel Peace Prize is awarded on this Day in the City Hall of Oslo. This City Hall of Oslo is also historic for many reasons. In 1915, Oslo was known as Christiana. Their Mayor, Hayedal planned to build a public Hall. Subsequently a competition among the architects was arranged for designing the Hall which gave emphasised on architectural beauty.

The foundation laying ceremony of city hall was held in 1931 with the best design. The construction was completed in 1950. The City Hall, with a space of 4560 square meter is visited by at least one lac tourists every year. Since 1990, Nobel Peace Prize is awarded in the City Hall. The mid-day of 10th December was the historic moment for the Bangladeshi people. For the first time, Bangladesh was getting the Nobel Prize. Apart from performing professional duties of collecting news, some sort of excitement was working within us. The Pressmen were supposed to enter into the specified floor of City Hall between 11:30 and 12:30 p.m. I along with my team reached the Press Lobby of the City Hall which was crowded with Pressmen not only from Norway but from different countries of the world. There was no space for placing tripod in the Press Lobby. With lots of struggle, I managed a space for tripod and got a seat. We found that City Hall filled with the guests. Six minutes to 1pm Dr. Md. Yunus entered the City Hall with his usual dress of punjabi with off-white Koti. The Nobel Committee gave him a warm and thunderoas welcome. The same thing happened to Taslima Begum, representing the Grameen Bank Governing Body.

The Bangladeshi rural wife Taslima Begum wearing green katan sharee with Prof. Dr. Md. Yunus beside her sat in the same chair which famous world dignitaries once occupied in the past. They include people like Henry Dunant, Won Sun Suki and Mother Teressa. In front of them, sat the king Herald and Queen Sanja of Norway, Queen Sofia of Spain, Former President of Mexico Vincent Fox and his wife, Saudi Prince Talal Bin Abdul Aziz and many more dignitaries of the world. What more Bangladesh can expect within 35 years of its independence?

In his speech, Danbolt Maoz, Chairman of Nobel Peace Committee paid homage to Prof. Dr. Md. Yunus as 'Modern Gandhi' and praised the concept of Prof. Yunus for poverty alleviation which will help to restore peace all over the world. Then, Prof. Dr. Md. Yunus started his historic speech on this great occasion. In his long speech titled "Let's send poverty to museum", Prof. Yunus said 94 percent of world income goes to only 40 percent people, the rest 60 percent live on the balance 6 percent. In his speech, Prof. Yunus addressed the issues which include poverty alleviation through various technologies, human rights, open market economy, social stock market, globalisation, history of Grameen Bank etc. In his speech, he also mentioned the business relationship between Grameen Phone and Telenor and the role of Grameen Phone in Bangladesh economy. He hoped that a day will come when the poor people of Bangladesh will be the co-owner of Grameen Phone. As a part of his future plan, he mentioned about social business. Anyway, the text of Prof. Dr. Md. Yunus' speech on the grand occasion has been known to the people of Bangladesh through BTV and Channel-i and some newspapers also published the text of his full speech on 11th December.

After the Nobel Peace Prize ceremony, CNN recorded a 40-minute interview at 5:00 p.m. in the Oslo City Hall in presence of thousands of guests. Mr. Jonathan, the CNN celebrity took the interview.

This interview was very disciplined and well planned. No wonder, it was a CNN show. They also showed five video clippings during the interview which showed the role played by Grameen Bank in aid of flood victims through micro-credit scheme and socio-economic condition of Bangladesh as well. This also showed the political violence, processions and pictures of torching of vehicles etc. Many issues came up in Jonathan's interview. At one stage, he asked whether the question of interest in micro-credit is creating any problem in a Muslim country like Bangladesh. Dr. Yunus tackled the press smartly with his straight forward answer. Jonathan also asked how a banker can get a Nobel Peace Prize? Dr. Yunus defended him as a banker and argued that all leading banks of the world should have micro-credit system. This should never be seen with a negative approach, Later the same night, I took an one hour special interview of CNN's great presenter Jonathan. I observed that Mr. Jonathan knows a lot about Prof. Yunus and also had a thorough study on him. He repeatedly referred Prof. Yunus as the hero of development.

I observed with disappoinment that on such a great occasion for Bangladesh, no representative of Bangladesh Govt. or major political parties thought it necessary to attend. Pity, when the world dignitaries came all the way to Oslo as personal friends of Prof. Yunus, no top leaders of Bangladesh thought it fit to join the rare occasion to pay homage to Nobel Peace Prize winner from Bangladesh.

Huge number of people congratulated Prof. Yunus when this great announcement came on 13th Oct. Big receptions were also awarded to him. Then what was the obstacle to travel to Oslo to join this greatest event? I do not know whether Nobel Committee invited Bangladesh Govt. to attend the ceremony. Also, I am not aware whether the Bangladesh Govt. made any effort to ensure participation of imminent persons from Bangladesh. These questions came to my mind after participating in an interview with Swedish TV-STV.

On 11th December, I gave an interview to STV in the Grand Hotel at 11:00am. The interviewer asked me many searching questions relating to acceptability and position of Prof. Yunus, in the Govt. circle and also wanted to know categorically whether any Bangladesh Govt. representative had come to attend this ceremony. He reminded me that in the past every Govt. sent their representatives with the Nobel Prize winner. Of course, in the past many Heads of Govt. also received Nobel Prize. That is a different issue. In fact, I could not give a satisfactory reply to the questions of that interviewer. Frankly speaking, I felt that Bangladesh Govt. as well as major political parties should have participated in this ceremony which brought rare honour to the country.

As a nation, Bangladesh is really proud to achieve this great honour of having a Nobel Peace Prize winner. On the day of my return to Bangladesh, I talked to some students and professionals living in Oslo. Their excitement and confidence overwhelmed me. They opined that Oslo has now projected a new Bangladesh. Now, we firmly believe that soon Bangladesh will curve out a special place of honour in the world map. Bangladesh's image abroad has improved a lot. In the past, immigration officials at foreign airports did not pay due honour to Bangladeshi nationals. I hope, this humiliating situation will now be over, at least partially. I got the proof while returning to the country. When the immigration officials saw our passport, they congratulated us as the country of Nobel Peace Prize winner. We felt proud as such things never happened before. Now we can look forward with our heads high. I hope, many will agree with me.

The writer is director and head of news, channel-i