The microfinance industry has been accused of “sucking blood from the poor” by the prime minister of Bangladesh as part of a growing backlash against the micro-lending business in the country of its birth.

Sheikh Hasina Wajed, prime minister, demanded an investigation into a mid-1990s fund transfer by pioneering microlender Grameen Bank. The bank was founded by Muhammad Yunus, the Bangladeshi economist renowned for his idea of lending small sums of money to poor women to start small businesses and lift their families out of poverty.

Mr Yunus won the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize and is treated as a national hero in Bangladesh. The criticism by the prime minister is the latest setback for an industry already reeling from a crisis in neighbouring India.