It is difficult to put him into the category of a saint or a social activist or even as a combination of the two. He is only one of his kind, so it becomes all the more difficult to compare him with anyone else in the world. His spirit of sacrifice and service was so high that he forgot his own worries and strived for the betterment of the underprivileged and the needy. He is Baba Amte, a person who lived so that the other too may live better.
Baba Amte was born in Hinganghat, Wardha district, Maharashtra on 24 december 1914. Even as a child, he was compassionate towards his servants and the lower classes. He studied law and set up practice in Wardha, which soon flourished.
Destiny beckons people through ways strange. 1n 1942 he witnessed the plight of a poor leper in Warora and that changed his course of life. He gave up his profession and began to work for the uplift of the poor and the downtrodden. In 1949, Baba Amte founded Anandvan for the rehabilitation of lepers who were shunned by society. This soon became a self-sufficient centre with its own university, hospital, technical units, orphanage, dairy and farmlands.
Due to his tireless work among the underprivileged he suffered from Spondylosis. In 2007, he was diagnosed with leukemia. The flame that burned with the love for the lowly was doused on February 9, 2008.