Former President of India : K R Narayanana

SPEECH BY SHRI K.R. NARAYANAN, PRESIDENT OF INDIA, WHILE CONFERRING THE GANDHI PEACE PRIZE FOR 1999 ON BABA AMTE

NEW DELHI, FRIDAY, JANUARY 14, 2000

It is both a pleasure and privilege for me to present the Gandhi Peace Prize for the year 1999 to Baba Amte. I should like to compliment the distinguished members of the jury for selecting Baba Amte for this prestigious Prize and also to convey my respectful felicitations to Baba Amte on winning this Peace Prize established in the name of Mahatma Gandhi.

Baba Amte is a living legend of our time and a shining example of the Gandhian spirit and approach to current and compelling social problems of the country. By crusading for human dignity and sustainable development he has sought to arouse the inner vitality of our society and invest it with sanity, peace and compassion. Inspired by Mahatma Gandhi Baba Amte had associated himself with the freedom struggle and courted imprisonment. Imbibing the values of service to the people from Gandhiji, he had, from his childhood days, identified himself with the lowliest and the lost in our society.

Like Gandhi he devoted himself to the service of people affected by leprosy and believed as Gandhiji said, "Leprosy work is not merely a medical relief; it is transforming frustration of life into the joy of dedication, personal ambition into selfless-service". 'Anandwan', which he set up for leprosy patients, provided through a creative combination of medical intervention, rehabilitation and economic regeneration, self-esteem and self-reliance to leprosy affected people thus translating the ideal of Mahatma Gandhi to make the victims of leprosy "as much a part of society as the tallest among us".

Baba Amte's life and activities have been animated by the Constructive Programme devised by Mahatma Gandhi for attainment of independence for India. Starting with leprosy affected people Baba Amte's work covered education in health and hygiene, village sanitation, village industries, communal unity and removal of untouchability and work among tribals and the youth of the country. He is perhaps the first man in the post independence India who has so passionately carried forward the Gandhian movement to see the glow of Swaraj on the face of the common man and woman of our country.

Baba Amte, like Mahatma Gandhi, remains a remarkably modern man. To promote rural development and the upliftment of the rural poor, he consulted and took advice from agricultural experts, engineers, social scientists and administrators and others for evolving schemes for conservation of energy, development of renewable sources of energy and better use of land and water resources. He believed that spinning and agro-industrial activities and generally small and beautiful projects would be "the spearhead of a silent social revolution fraught with far-reaching consequences". He introduced at Anandwan and other tribal areas rain-harvesting experiments for augmenting agricultural production. It is interesting to recall in this context that Gandhiji had said as early as 1946 that "owing to our neglect and folly, the year's rains are allowed to run down into the Bay of Bengal and the Arabian Sea. If all this water was trapped and harnessed to irrigational purposes... there should be no famine and food shortage in India."

Baba Amte, as a passionate and tireless social activist, has been propagating his ideas among the common people, especially among the youth of the country. He told the youth that "greater joy in life comes as you invest yourself in others", that youth should be "drenched with adventure and purpose" and that it is "youth who carries with him major action in human history". How he organized the youth of India in the "Knit India Movement" across the East and the West, the North and the South of the country, is a saga of our times. He mobilised youth power for national integration, national reconstruction, for communal harmony and environmental awareness through non-violent and peaceful means. In the Seminars he organized during the "Knit India movement", he exhorted our youth that they should not shun any work because work alone will give them self-confidence. Describing the Narmada Satyagraha as a new battle front for youth action, he said that it was an "outburst of Gandhian courage and concern for antyodaya". He stated poignantly "Now that the sun of life is about to set I have set out to catch the rising sun of environmental consciousness". In our developmental efforts India and the world have to, willy-nilly, come to terms with the ideas of Baba Amte.

I cannot but recall on this occasion the journey that Baba Amte took to Mumbai and the work he did among the victims of communal riots and violence in 1992. He then described himself "I am a Hindu Brahmin; but I am also a follower of Jesus Christ". Baba Amte is a universal man united with suffering mankind. Who else is there than this noble soul who is entitled to receive the Gandhi Peace Prize?

Thank you

Jai Hind

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