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| Dr Khan’s services for
poverty alleviation lauded |
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Sunday, June 22, 2008
Noor
Aftab
Islamabad
Speakers at a memorial lecture on
Saturday termed Dr. Akhter Hameed Khan as an outstanding social
scientist of his time who was recognised globally for his pioneering
contributions to theory and practice of poverty alleviation through
social mobilisation.
The annual memorial lecture was jointly
organised by Rural Support Programme Network (RSPN), Council of
Social Sciences (COSS) and Institute of Rural Management (IRM) here.
The speakers said Dr. Akhter Hameed deeply influenced the
development discourse not only in Pakistan but in several other
countries where ideas introduced by him were largely adopted for
poverty alleviation. They said guiding principal given by Dr. Khan
focuses on social mobilisation that allows people to harness their
true potential for social uplift and improvement in the standard of
life. Special Assistant to the Prime Minister Hina Rabbani Khar
while speaking as a chief guest said the Andra Pradesh (India) model
based on Dr. Khan’s analytical thinking has proven that the poor are
clearly able to help themselves.
Hina Rabbani said the rural
support networks have started mutual reinforcement and learning for
the past few years and success of establishment of basic health
units all over the country speaks volumes of ongoing efforts to
facilitate people at their doorsteps.
She said Dr. Akhter
Hameed was champion of poor segments of the society and his ideas
continue to be a source of inspiration for social scientists,
economic managers and all those related to poverty alleviation
programmes.
“Dr. Khan strongly believed in social equality
and we should put in our best efforts to continue his mission for
social uplift of poor strata of the society,” she said.
Keynote speaker Kopula Raju, principal secretary of the
government of Andra Pradesh, said Dr. Khan’s work for finding long
term solutions to complex socio-economic problems afflicting the
poor is truly inspiring for all generations.
He lived his
life for others and those who live for others live forever. The
biggest contribution that Dr. Khan made to society was to correct
our distorted perception of the poor. He taught us through his
lifelong work that poverty arises not out of lack of money, but out
of constant disempowerment, he said.
He emphasised the
importance of how we need to build on the tradition of promoting
self-reliance among poor communities. “The remarkable achievements
of his work are centred in his passionate belief, conceptual clarity
and his methodology of empowering poor to help themselves in
achieving the goal of true development.
Raju said the poor
of Andra Pradesh, who have now formed self-managed and self-reliant
organisations, covering 8.8 million poor women, owe it to Dr. Khan
for showing the world the intrinsic potential of the poor that lay
buried deep under the prejudices and insensitivities of the
governing elite.
Earlier, in the welcome address RSPN
Chairman Shoaib Sultan gave a brief history of the establishment of
the network and the support of the successive governments to set up
its provincial networks in all the federating units. Later, a
documentary was screened to the audience on the life and
achievements of Dr. Akhter Hameed Khan.
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ISSN 1563-9479
