Prakash Baba Amte is a social worker from Maharashtra, India. Amte and his wife, Mandakini Amte, were awarded the Magsaysay Award for 'Community Leadership' in 2008 for
their philanthropic work in
the form of the Lok Biradari Prakalp amongst
the Madia Gonds in the Gadchiroli district of Maharashtra and the neighbouring states of Telangana and Madhya Pradesh. In November 2019 he was awarded with ICMR Lifetime
Achievement Award by Bill Gates.
Prakash Amte is the second son of
Magsaysay awardee Baba Amte. He obtained a medical
degree from Government Medical College (GMC), Nagpur, and he met his wife
Mandakini during their post graduation studies at Government Medical College
(GMC), Nagpur. Prakash and Mandakini joined Baba Amte and helped her
father and others overcome the taboo and fear of leprosy.
In 1973, Amte moved to Hemalkasa to start the Lok Biradari Prakalp, a project
for the development of tribal people, most of whom were the Madia Gond in the forests of Gadchiroli district. He lived and worked there for almost
twenty years performing emergency surgical procedures without electricity. The
project transformed into a hospital, Lok Biradari Prakalp Davakhana, a residential school, Lok
Biradari Prakalp Ashram Shala, and an orphanage for injured wild animals,
the Amte's Animal Park. The
project provides health care to about 40,000 individuals annually.
The Lok Biradari Prakalp Ashram School has over 600 students, residents and day scholars. Work of Amte's for Gond tribals and their philanthropic work in the form of the Lok Biradari Prakalp amongst the Madia Gonds in Gadchiroli district of Maharashtra and the neighbouring states of Andhra Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh also won them recognition. Dr Prakash and his family also run a large animal conservation facility in Hemalkasa in Gadchiroli district of Maharashtra where rare, protected, and endangered animals are cared and have freedom to roam. The family's legacy in philanthropy and animal conservation is now carried over by their sons Digant and Aniket and their respective families who are helping their parents now.
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