Hemalkasa Gallery:

A group, including a young Baba and Indu, stand in front of the first tribal hut visited.

In 1971 Baba Amte trekked into the jungle with forty young people. In 1973, barely a year after he had undergone surgery for his back problem, Baba pitched a tent at Hemalkasa, a place deep in the forests about 350 kilometers south of Nagpur. Lok Biradari Prakalp (Brotherhood of the People) was born. Baba Amte's concern for the Madia Gonds of this region goes back to the time he hunted with them as a boy. They are among the most 'backward' tribals, depending on forest produce and wild creatures for food. For treatment they often resort to medicine men and witch doctors. When the Amtes started their clinic they found that a witch doctor, probably fearing he would lose his practice to these interlopers, had strung up a row of headless sacrificial cocks on the site.

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