The couple has been keeping Gandhi's ideology alive in the conflict hit state ever since.
It is a rare sight to see a Naga woman cook Poha in her traditional kitchen, but Lentina Ao, the 86-year-old Padma Shri awardee is well acquainted with Gujarati cuisine as she is married to Natwar Thakkar, a Gujarati from Maharashtra. Thakkar made the remote Naga hills his home after setting up the Nagaland Gandhi Ashram in 1952 in Chuchuyimlang. The couple has been keeping Gandhi's ideology alive in the conflict hit state ever since.
Speaking about the Naga problem that has kept the state under turmoil for decades, the 87-year-old Gandhian says he expects peace in the region. "Sooner or later there will be a solution. We have come a fairly long way. Patience and development is the way forward," he says showing rare pictures of Gandhiji his home.
Thakkar, who did not leave the Nagaland Gandhi Ashram despite an attempt at his life in 1957, is now happy that the Ashram is about to become a centre for learning of Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS). The institute is offering a Master's Degree in Social Entrepreneurship and Human Development here. The academy of Human Development was inaugurated on October 2, 2015 by the then Minister for Human Resource and Development Smriti Irani. The first batch of the MA course will be inducted in June later this year.
Lentina Ao, herself a Gandhian, met Thakkar in Guwahati when she was a part of the Kasturba Gandhi Memorial Trust. "She was the first Gandhian to be trained there," Thakkar says with pride.
"I chose to come to Nagaland because I wanted to help the movement in integrating the country. We were asked to choose a place near the borders to work in," he said.
Proud of the Gandhian legacy, the couple live a simple life with their daughter.
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