It
has been decided by Department to release commemorative postage stamps and
philately stationary items on Baba Amte on 30th December 2014.
Murlidhar
Devidas Amte popularly
known as Baba Amte, was an Indian social worker and social activist
known particularly for his work for the rehabilitation and empowerment of poor
people suffering from leprosy. Baba Amate was born to Mr. Devilal singh and
Mrs. Laxmibai Amte in the city of Hinganghat in Wardha
District of Maharashtra. It was a wealthy family. His father was a
British government official with responsibilities for district administration
and revenue collection. Murlidhar had acquired his nickname Baba in
his childhood.
He
came to be known as Baba not because "he was a saint or any such thing,
but because his parents addressed him by that name."
As
the eldest son of a wealthy landowner, Murlidhar had an idyllic childhood. By
the time he was fourteen, he owned his own gun and hunted boar and deer. He
developed a special interest in cinema, wrote reviews for the film magazine
the Picturegoer and
even corresponded with Greta Garbo and Norma
Shearer. Norma Shearer became one of his first foreign donors when he began
working with leprosy patients. When he was old enough to drive, he was given a
Singer sportscar with cushions covered with panther skin. He never appreciated
the restrictions that prevented him from playing with the 'low-caste' servants'
children. "There is a certain callousness in families like mine." he
use to say. "They put up strong barriers so as not to see the misery in
the world outside and I rebelled against it.
