Pakistan's Dr Amjad Saqib awarded prestigious Ramon Magsaysay Award

KARACHI: Dr Amjad Saqib, a social development expert and founder of Akhuwat Foundation has been awarded the Ramon Magsaysay Award 2021 for his poverty alleviation work in Pakistan, ARY News reported on Tuesday.

This award is given every year to individuals who have made extraordinary contributions to the eradication of poverty and the development of the society in Asia.

Ten distinguished Pakistanis have been among those presented this prestigious award said to be equal to the Nobel Award in Asia.

Dr Amjad Saqib, was given recognition with the award for providing interest-free loans for poverty alleviation. Akhuwat Foundation has provided Rs 150 billion interest-free loans to the people belong to the lower strata of the society.

Pakistan’s renowned social worker Abdul Sattar Edhi and Bilquis Edhi had won the Ramon Magsaysay Award for public service in 1986. Among other distinguished Pakistanis who won this award for their services to the society also included Dr. Akhtar Hameed Khan who was the first from the country to won Magsaysay award in 1963, human rights activist Asma Jahangir in 1995, Dr Adeeb Rizvi in 1998, Dr Ruth Pfau in 2002 and IA Rehman in year 2004.

President Ramon Magsaysay of the Philippines, was died in a plane crash in 1957. Ramon Magsaysay Award was established in his memory. He is considered to have brought the Philippines in a golden age with a climate of good democracy and zero corruption.

Several prominent world figures have received the award, which is 64 years old and is often referred to as the “Asia s version of the Nobel Prize,” such as the Dalai Lama of Tibet in 1958 and Mother Teresa of India in 1962.