Girish Prabhune

Girish Yashwant Prabhune is a social worker and writer in Pune who has spent his life working with Maharashtra’s nomadic and denotified tribes. He was named for the Padma Shri in 2021 in the field of social work, from Maharashtra ^[1].

Rural roots

Prabhune was born on 19 October 1949 ^[2]. He worked with Gramayan, a rural development and research group that tried collective farming among poor communities and helped families of denotified tribes who had been driven from their homes return to them ^[2].

Organising the communities

He organised the Bhatke Vimukta Vikas Parishad to work for formerly “criminal” and nomadic tribes, bringing communities together and giving young men and women vocational training ^[2]. He started income-earning projects such as bakeries, brick-making, pickles, jams, papad and dairy, and formed women’s self-help groups ^[2]. He set up 12 hostels and 2 schools ^[2].

He helped resettle people who had given up crime and surrendered their weapons to the police, giving them homes, work and a community ^[2]. He was a founder of several projects for particular communities, including the Yamgarwadi project at Tuljapur in 1991 ^[2].

The gurukul

Prabhune founded the Punarutthan Samarasata Gurukulam, a school for children from classes 1 to 10 that combines academic study with skills ^[2]. More than 320 children from the Pardhi, Dombari, Kolhati and other communities study there ^[2]. He is also a trustee of the Krantiveer Chapekar Smarak Samiti in Chinchwad ^[2].

Writer

He writes columns and stories for Marathi newspapers and magazines, and his books include Pardhi and Palavarcha Jina ^[2]. His many honours include the Chaturang Jeevan Gaurav Puraskar in 2015 ^[2].