Six years on, Sir Fazle Hasan Abed’s legacy endures
Today marks the sixth death anniversary of Sir Fazle Hasan Abed, founder of BRAC, the world's largest non-governmental development organisation.
He passed away on 20 December 2019 at the age of 83 while undergoing treatment in Dhaka.
Born in 1936, Sir Fazle Hasan Abed studied accountancy in London and qualified as a cost and management accountant in 1962. His life and career took a decisive turn following the devastating cyclone of 1970 and the Liberation War of 1971. At the time, he was working for a multinational company in Pakistan. After the outbreak of the war, he resigned and moved to London, where he helped establish Action Bangladesh and HELP Bangladesh to support Bangladesh's struggle for independence.
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After independence in 1972, Sir Fazle returned to Bangladesh and travelled to Sunamganj, where widespread destruction, poverty and displacement had left communities struggling to survive. With millions of refugees returning from India, urgent relief and rehabilitation were needed. At the age of 36, he founded BRAC in Shalla, Sunamganj, initially as a small relief and resettlement initiative.
Over the following five decades, BRAC grew into a global development organisation with programmes spanning education, health, livelihoods, social protection and enterprise development. Today, BRAC works with more than 145 million people across 14 countries in Asia and Africa.
Sir Fazle Hasan Abed's work was driven by a belief that people, regardless of circumstance, possess the capacity to change their own lives when given appropriate opportunities and support. That principle continues to guide BRAC's mission.
In recognition of his lifelong contribution to social development, Sir Fazle Hasan Abed was posthumously awarded the Independence Award 2025, the highest civilian honour of Bangladesh.
He received numerous national and international honours during his lifetime, including the World Food Prize (2015), the Lego Prize (2018), the Knight of the Order of Orange-Nassau from the Netherlands (2019), and the UNDP Mahbub ul Haq Award for Exceptional Contribution to Human Development (2004), among many others. In 2009, he was awarded the Most Distinguished Order of Saint Michael and Saint George by the British Crown. He was also recognised by Ashoka as one of its Global Greats.
Sir Fazle Hasan Abed received honorary degrees from leading institutions, including Princeton University, the University of Oxford, Columbia University and Yale University. He was listed among Forbes magazine's top 50 global leaders in 2014 and 2017 and served as an eminent adviser to the United Nations on development issues.
