PDFs shared by him

Some ideas from Laurie Baker about constructing low-cost buildings, especially applicable to rural areas.

Also watch these videos of his:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SoJR6nFMTxU

https://youtu.be/3F53tw3q2Go?t=582

An excellent book on teaching sports in schools, offices, and any small spaces. A must read for every sports teacher and school principal.

In small areas one can not play like it is an international stadium. But one can plan the whole game in such a way that it can be played well with a different set of rules of the game which work well in small spaces.

Cricket, football and many other simpler games like kho-kho are covered in the book.

This video summarises this book well: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-f3HalMhjpI

This is an excellent book on education. It is basically a story of an inspired teacher who taught his uninterested students using interesting teaching methods to generate interest in them.

Annotated version of this PDF - my personal copy: https://www.dropbox.com/s/5m8zhndmy4dfmi4/DIVASWAPNA%20--%20GIJUBHAI%20BADHEKA%20%24%24%24%20MUST%20READ%20-%20ds.pdf?dl=0

Janusz Korczak had an immense love and respect for children. I have not read this book much but I want to read it. I read this from the beginning of this book (in a Forward written by Ari L. Goldman):

"The little volume you are holding in your hands can change your life as a parent. It can rescue you not only from “the experts” but also from overmedicating and over-evaluating and over-obsessing about your child. It might also help you strip away the earphones, the remotes, and the computers. What children really need is someone to listen to them. How do you listen? I’ve struggled with this question both as a parent and as a journalist. Early in my career, I was an education reporter for a major American newspaper. I often went into schools to report. I’m pretty good at getting people to open up, but I could never get schoolchildren to talk to me. Korczak had some good advice. “The child is small, lightweight, and there is just less of him,” he writes. Imagine, he suggests, what we must look like to a small child. We’re big; they’re tiny. There’s only one way to talk to them, he adds: “We ought to stoop and come down to his level.” Things changed for me when I got down on my knees. Once on their level, I found I didn’t even have to ask questions. I just listened. If you’re there listening, children will talk. Children, of course, value little things far more than they value us. Korczak helps us gaze into their pockets and cubbies to see their treasures: pieces of string, nails, pebbles, beads, bits of colored glass, birds’ feathers, pinecones, ribbons and bus tickets—as he puts it, “cherished belongings and dreams of a wonderful life.” Later he adds: “Dogs, birds, butterflies, and flowers are equally close to his heart, and he feels kinship with each pebble and shell.” I shudder to think what Korczak would have thought of Game Boys. Think about it. What would you rather find in your children’s pockets? Korczak died at the hands of the Nazis in 1942. Until his dying moments he comforted the two hundred orphans he cared for in the infamous Warsaw Ghetto. If you don’t know the story of Korczak’s brilliant career and tragic death, you can read it in the final pages of this book. But what I particularly like about this volume is that it takes Korczak’s wisdom about children out of the context of martyrdom. Most people learn about him through exhibits at various museums commemorating the Holocaust. Korczak, of course, deserves a place there. But he especially deserves to be remembered for what he taught us about children and about ourselves."

Arvind Gupta on Janusz Korczak: https://www.youtube.com/live/IMY3FDxQmbc?t=904s

An interview PDF shared above, which is on David Horsburg, is more useful.

Annotated version of this PDF: https://www.dropbox.com/s/lga0zue8dt0jcao/DH3%20-%20DAVID%20HORSBURGH%20OF%20NEELBAGH%20--%20ARVIND%20GUPTA%20%24%24%24%20DECCAN%20HERALD.pdf?dl=0

The excellent autobiography of Vinobha Bhave, also known as Gandhi's successor. He ran a very impressive movement called 'Bhudaan movement'. He used to walk around India, all on foot. In every village he went to, he was greeted as a family member. He used to ask every wealthy family, "Think of me as your sixth son, and give me one-sixth of your land so that I can distribute them to the poor farmers." Because of his sincerity and love for people, they used to give him that part of their lands.

The one who wrote the forward for this book, says: "IN APRIL 1951 Vinoba Bhave sprang into sudden prominence. He started his Bhoodan Yagna. This movement--which we translated into English as 'Land Gift Mission'--was a brilliantly simple conception. Vinoba went on foot from village to village appealing to landlords to hand over at least onesixth of their land to the landless cultivators of their village. 'Air and water belong to all,' Vinoba said. 'Land should be shared in common as well. The tone of voice in which this was said was all-important. It was never condemnatory, never harsh. Gentleness--true Ahimsa --was Vinoba's trade mark. A gentleness backed up by a life of such dedication and simplicity that few could listen to his pleading unmoved. In the first six years of his mission Vinoba walked over five thousand miles and received land for distribution which amounted to an area the size of Scotland."

No doubt, the moment faced many obstacles, but the fact that a man could convince landlords to donate one-sixth of their lands to someone to whom they were completely un-related, is something very impressive. Indeed, he could move people by Love.

Gandhi did the same. When he travelled in a train, he used to collect funds for Harijan upliftment (Harijan means 'men of God', the term he coined for the lower caste to change their image among the society). On every stop, crowds and crowds of people used to gather to meet him and ended up giving a lot of their wealth to him. Husbands used to be reluctant to allow their wives to meet him, worrying that they would give their jewellery to him. And they certainly did. They used to give their jewellery to him. All kinds of people used to give him a lot of money during his train journey. He could hardly sleep because people used to gather at every station. Even while sleeping, he would keep one hand just outside the window so that people could put currency notes in them. Read all that and much more in "Life of Gandhi" by Louis Fischer.

Vinoba says: "I began to ask for one sixth of the land. After that I said to people, see to it that no one in your village is without land. Next, I began to tell them that it was wrong to think in terms of land ownership at all, that land is for everyone, like air, water and sunlight."

Truely, the way things are now, healthy air is also going to be divided among people in a few years or decades. He was trying to remove boundaries, by his Love for people and humanity.