Shantilal Muttha, Founder and National President, Bharatiya Jain Sanghatana, is a tireless crusader for values-driven-education. A principle-centered human, he has changed the face and soul of thousands of schools in India; and is striving to accomplish the same with a million.
Mr Muttha, a sensitive human, has contributed across the length and breadth of the country through extraordinary deeds in school education, disaster management, and social service. A rare combination. The thousands of volunteers and office bearers of BJS believe in his credo of selfless service. The impact is visible and distinguished.
In 1993, after the Latur earthquake, Mr Muttha initiated a program to rehabilitate school children in the area. This gave birth to the Wagholi Educational Rehabilitation Center in Pune. As a result, 1,200 orphaned children from the 5th to 10th standard were transported from Latur to this school-cum-hostel, where they were nurtured through graduation. The same Center also accommodated school children from the 1997 Jabalpur earthquake, as well as the 2005 Kashmir earthquake. Mr Muttha, an extraordinary healer.
After the 2001 Gujarat earthquake, through Mr Muttha’s leadership, the BJS organization built 368 school buildings, with 1,000 classrooms, in 267 villages, in just 90 days. Further, after the 2005 tsunami along the eastern coastline of India, Mr Muttha and his team worked in the Andaman & Nicobar Islands to build 11 school buildings, 30 primary health sub-centers, and 4 semi-permanent and quake resistant structures. A mammoth task in view of the difficult logistics.
Mr Muttha is a humble man with a national mission: Improving the quality of education in primary and secondary schools. He is a giver. A giver of resources, ideas, energy, time, and commitment.
To catalyze his mission, Mr Muttha has also initiated multiple research projects directed at school accreditation, teachers’ training, students’ assessment, management development, and so on. The projects are being currently tested in Andaman & Nicobar Islands, Goa, and Gujarat.
Beyond a missionary, Mr Muttha is a visionary and a statesman.
We salute Mr Shantilal Muttha, Qimpro Platinum Standard 2010 for Education.