In Memoriam

David Suratgar (1938-2024)

David Suratgar, a retired Bank lawyer and raconteur extraordinaire, died last July at his home in Brandy Station, Virginia. He was 85.

David  joined the Bank’s legal department in the mid-1960s. As one of what was then a small group of lawyers, he helped  develop some of the key policy and procedure protocols on which the Bank’s lending program is based. For David, then in his twenties, it was an invigorating time.

He was born in London in 1938, the only child of an Iranian father and British mother. After an early childhood in Iran, during World War II he and his mother returned by convoy to Britain. He later read law at New College Oxford and followed this with a masters of international affairs at Columbia University in New York. In Oxford David met Barbara Lita Low, who was training as a nurse. They married in 1962 in New York where, prior to joining the Bank, David worked in the legal department of the UN Secretariat and at Sullivan and Cromwell. He also lectured at NYU Law School, an academic diversion he kept up in Washington at Georgetown University Law School.

After leaving the Bank in 1973, David had a long and illustrious career as a banker with Morgan Grenfell in London and became active in supporting the arts in and around his home in Oxfordshire.  Among other accomplishments, he helped save the Oxford Playhouse and helped start the famous Garsington Opera.

Among many gifts was his ability to relate to all types of people, a product of his mixed heritage. New acquaintances were regaled with his stories and experiences. He enjoyed sharing amusing anecdotes about some of the more colorful characters he encountered: among them, Stan Getz, the jazz saxophonist and his (David’s) favorite author, the Argentinian writer Jorge Luis Borges.

David also related wonderful stories of traveling to Africa by ship to help implement Bank-funded infrastructure projects. Suave and urbane, he exuded charm, wit, and good humor. Spending a few hours with David Suratgar was time well spent.

Roxanne Suratgar and her brother Karim Suratgar are David’s children. She is an engineering and finance consultant; he is an IFC lawyer. Peter Kyle, a family friend, is a retired World Bank lawyer

 

Submitted by Roxanne Suratgar, Karim Suratgar and Peter Kyle