Spreading Mahatma Gandhi’s message for nearly 50 years, Mumbai Sarvodaya Mandal started its challenge from Arthur Road Jail. Starting small with lectures and introducing Gandhi literature, the employer went online in 2002 ( ) and commenced undertaking tests on Gandhian philosophy in 2008. Having blanketed maximum prisons in 50 years of lifestyles, the Mandal takes pleasure in accomplishing over 5,000 prisoners and assisting transform many of them.
Convicted of crimes like theft, violence, and murder, Datta Shrikhande, 54, Santosh Bhintade, forty-five, and Laxman Gole, forty-eight, located the new way of life through Mandal’s efforts. T Somaiya, who has been working relentlessly to propagate Gandhian values, said, “We teach what colleges, mother and father and society can’t commonly provide our children. When they lose their way, they end up in prisons. We convey their desire that there is existence even after punishment,” Somaiya stated.
Santosh Bhintade changed into simply 22 while he was sentenced to imprisonment for inadvertently killing another teenager who was molesting a girl inside the neighborhood. He became despatched to Yerwada, where he studied Gandhian philosophy as he was already an avid reader. “I had finished my BCom, and Mahatma Gandhi’s writings weren’t new to me. Sudden upheavals in my lifestyle had made me revengeful.
“The crime becomes accidental, and the motive changed into to store the girl. It changed into a good deal later that Gandhiji’s works taught me to forgive, Bhintade stated. Forgiveness didn’t come smoothly to me, but after I read about the discrimination that Gandhiji experienced in South Africa, I started out relooking at my personal existence with a sparkling perspective,” he said, including that it wasn’t simple to allow the pass of the sensation of being punished for no incorrect.
Released early from prison in 2009, he finished his BA and MA from Ahmedabad University in Gandhi Philosophy. Bhintade got here again to his homeland Jalgaon in search of a process, wherein he met Narayanbhai Desai, a regarded Gandhian. “Desai requested me to work for Gandhi Research Foundation in Jalgaon. I right away took up the possibility because I had already given my existence to Gandhiji’s philosophy,” he said. In nowadays’s social scenario, Bhintade feels that Gandhian values will assist in maintaining human beings collectively. “I maintain discussing and telling people around me, mainly kids, to trust in Gandhiji’s teachings about staying in the right direction in every difficult situation,” he said.
Datta Shrikhande, 54
Born and raised in suburban Ambernath, Datta Shrikhande received this yr’s bodybuilding opposition Maharashtra Shree Gold for guys above 50 years. Also, a player in Master Chef India Season 3 in 2003, Shrikhande, didn’t win. Still, the show gave him a standing in society, specifically because, at one factor, he changed into a jail inmate. In Yerwada jail from 1986-89, Shrikhande never realized that he changed into in terrible agency. Addicted to pills, he engaged in crimes like theft and beatings. “There became nobody to guide me then. I went to jail when I was 22. My life turned into a large number. Later, I came across Gandhiji’s writings and became inspired. I regarded the Gandhi examination whilst in prison and wanted to read extra about his philosophy,” Shrikhande said.
After popping out in 1989, he spent some time in Muktangan, the de-addiction center in Pune. “I commenced witnessing violence early in existence and didn’t know that the alternative became something called non-violence. Amazed at how Mahatma Gandhi checked out the existence, I started out considering lifestyles without violence. I completed my schooling after coming out of jail at the age of 25. Later, I started operating as a cook dinner in Muktangan,” stated Shrikhande, who’s now a coordinator there. Later, he also started out exercising to live fit. “This yr, I won the competition for bodybuilding. The credit score for my transformation is going to Gandhian mind. It made ‘not possible’ viable. Now, I am a settled man with the circle of relatives, helping others to get returned to lifestyles,” he said.
Laxman Gole, 48
A motivational speaker, Laxman Gole, had 19 crimes registered against him and spent over 4 years in jail. On Monday, on the eve of Gandhi Jayanti, he addressed three hundred jail inmates in Taloja prison about the difficult yet straightforward direction of reality. “Truth is the best cost Gandhiji taught us. I learned it through the prison checks performed with the aid of Sarvodaya Mandal,” stated Gole, who got here out of jail in 2008. After his launch, he remained connected with Sarvodaya Mandal and volunteered to propagate Gandhi’s philosophy. He went to jails to try to remodel prisoners like him.
“I was giving lectures and counseling inmates. Those who had closed the door on me in early criminal life started welcoming me after the transformation. I additionally train psychology and control students approximately Gandhi’s relevance these days,” stated Gole, who finished his training after his launch. A resident of Karjat, he has fashioned a network of inmates who take his recommendation critically and need to spread positive alternate. “There are many who need to stay a normal existence and have a circle of relatives. I try to get jobs for them,” he said. Gole has additionally participated in fact shows narrating his past revel in and transformation.
