Founder of the country’s largest interest-free microfinance programme Akhuwat Dr Amjad Saqib has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize for his humanitarian work in poverty alleviation.

For this year’s Nobel Peace Prize, 343 candidates from around the world.

Akhuwat Foundation Chairman Dr Amjad has said that his services are beyond such awards and they are purely for the sake of Allah.

Earlier in August 2021, Dr Amjad Saqib won The Ramon Magsaysay Award 2021, popularly known as the Asian Nobel Prize, for his “first-of-its-kind” interest- and collateral-free microfinance programme that has helped millions of poor families.

Akhuwat is the largest microfinance institution in Pakistan, offering a package of loans for the poor. It has distributed 4.8 million interest-free loans amounting to the equivalent of USD 900 million, helping three million families, with a remarkable 99.9% loan repayment rate.

It’s phenomenal growth has fueled Akhuwat’s social support programs in fields like education, where, in partnerships with government and others, Akhuwat has “adopted” hundreds of neglected and non-functioning public schools and established four residential colleges (one of them for women) for poor and deserving students.

Akhuwat also runs a health services program, helping hundreds of thousands of patients; a “clothes bank” that has distributed more than three million clothes for the needy; and a program of economic, health, and psycho-social services for the discriminated transgender community.

In the Covid-19 pandemic, Akhuwat responded with emergency loans and grants, food relief, and other assistance in over a hundred cities in Pakistan.