The Healers of Hemalkasa

A young doctor couple gave up city life to settle in a remote forest, building a hospital, a school and an animal refuge for the Madia Gond community.

Dr. Prakash Amte, son of the renowned social worker Baba Amte, and his wife Dr. Mandakini Amte trained as physicians and could have chosen comfortable urban careers. Instead they chose Hemalkasa, a remote and forested part of Gadchiroli district in Maharashtra, home to the Madia Gond tribal community.

The project they joined, Lok Biradari Prakalp, was begun by Baba Amte in 1973. In its early days the couple lived without electricity, telephone or many basic comforts, practising medicine in the simplest of conditions and treating patients who had never before had access to a doctor.

Over the years their work grew into a hospital, a residential school for tribal children, and an animal orphanage that took in creatures orphaned or injured in the forest. Together these became a place of healing, learning and refuge for a community long left on the margins.

Their approach was rooted in living among the people they served rather than merely working for them, earning trust across generations. In 2008 Dr. Prakash Amte and Dr. Mandakini Amte received the Ramon Magsaysay Award for Community Leadership, honouring their compassionate, decades-long service in Hemalkasa.