Pune social activist Sindhutai felicitated
RAE BARELI : Social activist from Pune Sindhutai Sapkal received Dr Ram Manohar Tripathi Lok Sewa Samman at a programme organised in the memory of Acharya Mahavir Prasad Dwivedi here on Saturday.
She received a citation and cheque of Rs 25,000 from industrialist Umesh Sikeria.
Sindhutai runs Sanmati Bal Niketan for orphaned children in Pune. Taking up social work at the age of 20, she has given 50 years of her life working for the welfare of orphans.
The other personalities who were honoured on the occasion included former head of Hindi department, Lucknow University, Dr Surya Prasad Dixit and Manju Misra, who is promoting Hindi in California, USA.
Vartika Singh, who topped Rae Bareli district in UP Board’s intermediate examination, and litterateur Snehlata from Lucknow, were also felicitated. The annual Acharya Memorial Day is celebrated every year by Dwivedi Memorial Committee, Rae Bareli.
Addressing the programme, Sindhutai said she was driven out of her house by her husband and in-laws though she was pregnant. She gave birth to a girl child in a cowshed.
“I started begging in trains and railway platforms. I even begged at Lucknow railway station,” she recalled.
Today, Sindhutai runs orphanages in four districts of Maharashtra. The orphanages are run on public donation. Sindhutai gave her own daughter to an orphanage and brought up other orphans. She has supported about a thousand orphans, provided them education and arranged for their marriage. Her 80-year-old husband, who had abandoned her when she was 20, now wants to reunite with her. Sindhutai said she was ready to pardon him but would keep him like a son as she kept other children at the orphanage.