Rahman served as the Governor of Central Bank of Bangladesh during the period of May 2009-March 2016. After obtaining M.A. in Economics from Dhaka University, he pursued studies in the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London under a Commonwealth Scholarship, securing M.A. and PhD in Economics (1983). He was also awarded a Commonwealth Development Fellowship at the University of Manitoba in Canada (1989), a Ford Foundation Post-Doctoral Fellowship at The University of London (1991-92), and a Visiting Research Fellowship, at the Institute of South-East Asian Studies, Singapore (1998-99). Rahman has been awarded the Best Central Bank governor – Asia Pacific, 2015 by The Banker magazine, a Financial Times publication for his role in channeling credit towards environmentally and socially responsible development projects and very recently, the Emerging Markets (a subsidiary of the Euromoney) has also awarded him the “Central Bank Governor of the Year for Asia 2015”.