Baba Amte’s granddaughter dies after family feud

Dr Sheetal Amte-Karajgi, the granddaughter of the last activist Baba Amte, died after his health deteriorated on Monday. She was rushed to a hospital in Warora, Chandrapur district, where doctors declared her dead prior to admission. Police are waiting for the post-mortem report to establish the cause and whether it was death by suicide. They have declined to comment on reports that she injected herself with a lethal substance. Karajgi, 39, had studied medicine.

Sources said forensic experts from Nagpur sealed the room in Anandwan, the leprosy rehabilitation center founded by Baba Amte, where the body of Karajgi was found. She is survived by her husband Gautam Karajgi and her seven-year-old son Sharvil.

Warora Subdivision Police Officer Nilesh Pande told the Mirror that Karajgi was active as usual on Monday morning and had breakfast at around 10.30am, but her health suddenly deteriorated an hour later. “The room where his body was found will be examined by forensic experts,” Pande said, adding that “the autopsy will reveal whether the body has injection marks.” He said that in the meantime, an accidental death report has been registered. Police Inspector Dipak Khobragade from Warora Police Station said: “We cannot say if it is a suicide case. Only the post-mortem report will help establish probable cause. ”

Last week, a power dispute between members of Baba Amte’s family came to light, and various trustees met often to help resolve the dispute.

Karajgi allegedly had differences with her family over the management of Maharogi Seva Samiti, a social service organization founded by Baba Amte. The children of the late social activist, Vikas and Prakash, and their wives Bharti and Mandakini, respectively, had issued a clarification on November 22 regarding various accusations made by Karajgi on social media. Vikas Amte is Karajgi’s father and Mandakini is her mother.

The Maharogi Seva Samiti has large parcels of land in Chandrapur and the trust receives generous donations. It deals with the rehabilitation of some 2,500 disabled people in Anandwan and Somnath. Karajgi was the executive director of Samiti and stayed on the Anandwan campus. Gautam Karajgi had also moved to Anandwan from Pune to help her with the management of the trust.

On the morning of her death, Karajgi was sending a text message to the editor of the Maxmaharashtra news channel, Ravindra Ambekar. He shared with Mirror the last text message he sent him at 10:45 am: “The instability continues. The senior amtes want to solve, but Aniket (son of Dr. Prakash Amte) and Kaustubh (son of Dr. Vikas Amte) are extremely power hungry. I don’t want any power or anything but an honest and comprehensive backbone for this organization, which they won’t be able to maintain. Kaustubh is Karajgi’s older brother.

According to the family’s earlier clarification on November 22 of the Karajgi allegations, “Among us, Sheetal Gautam Karajgi, née Sheetal Vikas Amte, has contributed to the work done by our organization. She, however, faces mental stress and depression. Although he admitted it in his social media posts, he made inappropriate statements about the work, trustees and workers of Maharogi Seva Samiti. All your comments are unfounded. The Amte family is issuing this statement after mutual discussions to avoid any possible misunderstandings caused by Sheetal’s allegations. ”According to family sources, Karajgi was being treated by Dr. Anand Nadkarni at the Thane Institute of Psychological Health.

Karajgi had also done her masters in social entrepreneurship and studied leadership at the Harvard Kennedy School. She was honored as a young world leader at the World Economic Forum in 2016. On her own website, she described herself as a disability specialist, environmentalist, painter, photographer, and social entrepreneur. His last tweet was at 5.45am on Monday. She had posted an image of her work “War and Peace”, a 30 x 30 inch acrylic on canvas.