Baba Amte Quotes

When leprosy patients touched the soil, they transformed it into gold, but the politicians did that and made it into dirt.

[A balanced economic system is one which provides] sufficiency for all and superfluity for some. The MNCs have entered the country like nomads. The majority doesn't need Pepsi or Coke, they want water. You can have your skyscrapers and Cokes but before this you must ensure that that tribal girl defecating in the open has the privacy of a toilet.

The condition of the tribals is worse than those inflicted with leprosy. Purna swaraj can only be possible when the poorest of the poor is uplifted.

Joy is more infectious than leprosy.

The image of that dying leprosy patient was burning me like a branding iron and would not give me a moment’s rest. From that moment on I was out to conquer fear....Where there is fear there is no love. Where there is no love there is no God.

The common man, he is the uncommon man

I never had money. But that had never stopped me.

I, who had never had planted single seed in the estate was expected to enjoy the comfort of a beautiful farm house, while those who had toiled there all their lives had only the meanest hovels.

We all felt happy and excited because it was Diwali. My mother had saved lot of small coins from her shopping and gave them to me to buy crackers Stuffed full with sweets and feeling that life was grand I ran towards the market. Then I saw a blind beggar. He sat in the hot sun by the edge of the unpaved road while gusts of wind raised clouds of dust and rubbish over him. ‘Andhalalya paisa dey, Bhagwan’, he kept on saying to the passers , ‘Give one paisa to this blind man, oh! Bhagwan.’ In front of him there was a rusty cigarette tin. It struck me alongside my bright happy world there was a world of misery and pain.

A client would admit that he had committed rape, and I was expected to obtain an acquittal. And worse still, when I succeeded, I was expected to attend the celebration party.

The new leadership in India is taking shape quietly, without any drum beating through the newspapers. … Various centers, the centers of energy and strength in the life of society are gaining tremendous momentum. May be, the surging new generation of today appears to have lost its bearing, to have lost its soul. But it is absolutely certain that one day it will have its own leader and prophet.... I am absolutely confident that the phoenix of a new leadership is rising from the ashes of all its failure. Soon the world will witness the lightning hidden in its beak and the storm hidden in its wings.

Charity destroys, work builds.

I have never been frightened of anything. Because I fought British tommies to save the honor of an Indian lady, Gandhiji called me abhay sadhak, a fearless seeker of truth. When the sweepers of Warora challenged me to clean gutters, I did so. But that same person who fought goondas and British bandits quivered in fright when he saw the living corpse of TuIshiram, no fingers, no clothes, with maggots all over. That is why I took up leprosy work. Not to help anyone, but to overcome that fear in my life. That it worked out good for others was a by-product. But the fact is I did it to overcome fear.

There is a certain callousness in families like mine. They put up strong barriers so as not to see the misery in the world outside and I rebelled against it.

Those who indulge in history cannot create new history. You cannot legislate national integration unless political work is done constructively and there is a lifestyle for life.