Sir Fazle Hasan Abed no more

Sir Fazle Hasan Abed, founder of chair emeritus of world’s largest non-government development organisation Brac, passed away on Friday night at the age of 83.

He breathed his last at 8:28pm at Apollo Hospital in Dhaka, according to a Brac spokesman, report bdnews24.com and UNB.

“It is with the heaviest of hearts that we have to inform you of the passing of BRAC’s founder, Sir Fazle Hasan Abed, Abed Bhai, as we lovingly address him,” Asif Saleh, executive director of Brac, and Muhammad Musa, executive director of Brac International, said in a statement.

Sir Fazle Hasan Abed was hospitalised last month after falling ill.

He founded in 1972 what was then Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee (BRAC), later changed into Brac, to support war-torn Bangladesh’s rebuilding efforts after the Liberation War of Bangladesh.

It eventually grew into the world’s largest indigenous NGO and a global brand in the development community.

Sir Fazle Hasan Abed retired from his role as the Chairperson of the governing body of BRAC Bangladesh and BRAC International and transitioned to the role of Chair Emeritus.

The many prestigious awards won by Abed include Ramon Magsaysay Award for Community Leadership 1980. He has also won Spanish Order of Civil Merit and Leo Tolstoy International Gold Medal. He was among the Fortune magazine list of the world’s 50 greatest leaders in 2014 and 2017.

Born in 1936, he studied accountancy in London. The 1970 cyclone and 1971 Liberation War in Bangladesh dramatically changed the direction of his life after he started working as a senior corporate executive at Pakistan Shell. He left his job and moved to London, where he helped initiate Action Bangladesh and HELP Bangladesh in support of the war of independence from Pakistan. He returned to Bangladesh early in 1972 and started work to support the rebuilding efforts of the new nation.