The awardee of National Teachers Awards 1997
Honoured by President K. R. Narayanan(10th President of India)
The National Award for Teachers
is given in public recognition of valuable services to the community as a teacher of outstanding merit. The award is given for meritorious public service in the field of teaching.
Some people in our lives change our life. The life-light of such great people infuses light into our lives. Such persons unite day and night not only for their welfare, but also for the welfare of the society, and that too without expecting any fruit.
National Award-winning teacher "Shri Namdev Amrutrao Sutar" was such a great person. He was a social reformer and an excellent teacher, and contributed his whole life to social welfare. A book will fall short of his biography, but we try to pay homage to such a great person by offering some words about his life.
Life Summary
After class 10th
While doing good work on the income of Eighteen Rozandari, someone said some bitter words to a young boy about the carpentry work, which pricked that boy very much and he felt very bad.
When he came home in anger, he decided that he would never touch those tools for the rest of his life.
In the meantime, he saw an advertisement for the job of a teacher in the newspaper and on one page he wrote an application for that job and sent it.
And luckily, after a few days, that boy was appointed to the post of primary teacher in Basmat village of Kamanuri taluka in Parbhani district of Maharashtra state.
This boy living in Jalgaon did not even have money to go to Parbhani, that boy asked his father for money but his father could not give that much money due to his bad financial condition.
But seeing the good stubbornness of the boy, one of his father's friends, Mr. Rambhau Shimpi, gave him 9 rupees for his bus fare, in which he reached Parbhani. But he had to walk several miles to a small village, because at that time the transportation facilities were negligible.
Service as a Teacher
But the village sarpanch was good, he gave a small place to spend the night. Gradually the villagers started liking the people as a teacher, the friendly nature and the good conduct of that boy. Later, he was also given separate teacher training by the Maharashtra State Government.
He started getting respect in the village, people started meeting him with respect. Thus began the journey from a normal boy to a respected teacher.
For 4 consecutive years, he did a lot for the children and the village, where only the puzzle was in the second grade, he started the classes up to the fourth grade explained the importance of literacy to the people, gradually he encouraged many other social useful things besides education in the village. For all these works, he was honoured with "Gram Gaurav" in the village. Since then he became popular with the respected nickname "Guruji".
The villagers were so far away from the rest of the world that the villagers did not know about cinema, so at that time he carried the reel of cinema on his shoulders, and put a curtain in the village, informing all the villagers about cinema. And made the villagers aware of many other modern facilities.
After some years Guruji got transferred from there. He was appointed in Jintur, a lawyer named Anand gave Guruji a house on rent in Jintur, in this house Guruji lived continuously for 27 years, some people told Anand Vakil(lawyer) that if you let this teacher stay for so many years, then someday this teacher will takeover your house. On this, Anandji laughed and replied that I have 7 children, and Guruji is my eighth child.
The meaning of saying this is that people who knew him well trusted him blindly, and his clean character was his biggest asset.
In National Cadet Corps
One day a cooperative worker was bitten by a snake in Jinturki Pathshala. Then Guruji, not caring about his life, took out the poison from the snakebite wound of the employee with his mouth and saved his life. One of the reasons he received the national honour was also that he selflessly saved the life of a person. All devoted attitude was in his nature.
Guruji always helped the poor and helpless students financially and educationally and even taught them free of cost even after school time.
Guruji also had a special interest in science and was always at the first position in science fairs and competitions every year. The subjects of science demonstration were too useful to the society such as ‘Population Control’, ‘Save Water, Save Life’, ‘Save Trees’.
After Jintur, he was transferred to the primary school in Phufnagri village of Jalgaon district, where he continued his academic service for 12 years. When he was serving in Phufnagri, in the year 1997 he was declared the National Honor for Teachers.
Not only on education, he had done a lot of work for his society as well, he also held the post of President of Sutar Samaaj (Carpenter Society) for many years, during that time he also did much commendable work for his society.
His wife Shakuntalabai also contributed a lot throughout his life, behind every success of Guruji, the contribution of his wife Shakuntalabai was equally commendable.
He had four daughters, but he never made any distinction between son and daughter and educated his daughters also, and today his four daughters are making their father's name proud.
Many of his students are still appointed in great positions and following the footsteps of Guruji, the society is doing useful work in all fields.
On Thursday 24th April 2014, this great teacher left his body by taking his last breath.
But his education, his thoughts, his ideas are still showing the true way of living to thousands of people, his life was, is and will be his message.