It is also very engaging - and a delight - to go back to Bangladesh as often as I can, which is not only my old home, but also where some of my closest friends and collaborators live and work.

To conclude this discussion, assessment of justice demands engagement with the 'eyes of mankind',first, because we may variously identify with the others elsewhere and not just with our local community;second, because our choices and actions may affect the lives of others far as well as near;and third,because what they see from their respective perspective of history and geography may help us to overcome our own parochialism.

There's absolutely no reason why at the level of basic schooling that there should be any inequity whatsoever. And [that's] the first direction to go, [but] that need not prevent you from doing all the other equalities that you want.

The opportunities, income, schools facilities, the basic income support that the government provides or any of these things .. public transport arrangements we have.. all these are part of the way our lives and freedoms are effected.

To say that certainly America was very lucky to get a large amount of land, and the native Indians were extremely unlucky to have white men coming over here, is one thing. But to say that the whole of the American prosperity was based on exploiting the indigenous population would be a great mistake.

One has to be realistic. One’s concern for equity and justice in the world must not carry one into the alien territory of unreasoned belief. That’s very important.

If you're dealing with grappling [with] problems of feeding people, the biggest impact in fertility reduction is girls' schools. Schooled girls make a bigger impact on that than any other factor - not these various regulations [such as] you have to have one child or that. It turns out that none of these are effective.