“The rural poor welcomed me with open arms”
B. Sandman; Shoaib Sultan Khan: “I never felt that I was in an alien country”
“Both India and Pakistan can benefit immensely from each other’s experience in reducing poverty” – Shoaib Sultan Khan
The poverty reduction model launched by Shoaib Sultan Khan, a pioneer of rural development in Pakistan, has been replicated on a huge scale over the decades in India. Khan’s expertise has always been available to India, no matter how adversarial relations between the two states were.
Khan is the honorary chairperson of the board of directors of Rural Support Programmes Network (RSPN) comprising 11 RSPs, including Aga Khan Rural Support Programme (AKRSP), National Rural
Support Programme (NRSP) and Thardeep Rural Development Programme (TRDP). His “magical ower” to mobilise communities for their development has led to numerous awards, including the Ramon Magsaysay Award 1992 and Pakistan’s Sitara-e-Eisaar and Hilal-i-Imtiaz in 2006. He was elected as Senior Ashoka Fellow and nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2009. 
He recently visited India at
the invitation of the Rajiv Gandhi Foundation, which has adopted and implemented the rural support
programme model. Back in Pakistan, he spoke to Aman Ki Asha on the need for the two countries to
cooperate in reducing poverty and benefit from each other’s experiences. Excerpts:
By Shahzada Irfan Ahmed
Aman Ki Asha: When did India replicate the RSP model for the first time? How did you feel when you went there to execute the plan during PM Narasimha Rao’s tenure? What was it like being a Pakistani
in India, delivering to the Indian poor?
Categories: Asia