Pune: When the Padma Awards, the highest civilian honours of India – were announced on January 25, on the eve of Republic Day, one name stood out of the entire list and that was of Girish Yashwant Prabhune!

With a strong on-ground connect but aloof from the media, glamour and attention, Girish Prabhune is one person who should have been conferred upon this prestigious award way back.

Girish Prabhune is known as a famous social worker and Marathi writer based in Pune, but not many would know how huge and highest of respect he commands from the nomadic tribes and communities – especially the Pardhi tribe, which remains shackled by the stigma of being a thieving tribe.

Girish was first associated with Gramayan. Alongwith Yashwant Thakar and other workers he experimented with collective farming among the backward communities. This was appreciated by people like SG Majgaonkar and SH Deshpande.

The Pardhi community in Maharashtra was termed as criminals under the Criminal Tribes Act 1871 by the British. This act was repealed in 1952. Girish Prabhune started Bhatake Vimukt Vikas Pratishthan in 1992 with support from like-minded people. Late Bhimrao Gasti was the President of the Pratishthan. Late Damuanna Date, Late Mukundrao Panashikar and many others supported him in this cause.

The organisation helped in setting up abodes for the tribes, identifying open spaces in selected areas for the wandering tribes to set up their camps, standing up for them in case of false criminal and legal charges, providing schools for ensuring continued education for their children, liaising with philanthropic bodies and industrial houses for financial and/or material assistance.

Besides providing legal and other support to Pardhis and other denotified communities, a residential school for children of these communities was started in Yamgarwadi in Osmanabad district. An experiment to settle the Pardhis for the first time was carried out at Magarsangavi.

Prabhune is the leading spokesperson for these nomads and runs the famous ‘Punaruththan Samarasata Gurukulam‘, a residential school for Pardhi children based out of Pimpri-Chinchwad.

The school, a residential facility based on the ancient Gurukul education system, runs through crowdfunding and donations. Besides academic, skill-based training is being provided to these students from an early age. The social work done by this organisation was appreciated by many stalwarts in the society.

RSS Chief Mohan Bhagwat had visited this organisation in February 2016 and praised the work carried out by this organisation. Besides Bhagwat, former president Pratibha Patil, Women and Child Development Minister Pankaja Munde and renowned social worker Anna Hazare have also visited the facility in the past.