Bhubaneswar: ‘Ama Pathaagaara’, an initiative for library movement in Odisha, felicitated well-known social activist Ratnakar Sahoo at a function here on Friday.
Sahoo, who has done pioneering work related to community-based rehabilitation of disadvantaged children in Odisha including those suffering from drug abuse, is known for transforming a ‘Madhushala’ in a slum in Damana in the city to a ‘Pathashaala’.
Actress and activist Varsha Priyadarshini launched ‘Ama Pathaagaara’, originally envisioned by late Dasia Aja, to re-ignite the library movement in the state. Dasia Aja started with just 5 books and ended up founding a library which now houses over 1.5 lakh books and periodicals, palm leaf manuscripts, paintings and other research materials.
For this particular event held on Friday, Varsha set up a library in Ashraya Old Age
Home in Unit VI, managed by Odisha Patita Udhar Samiti. Apart from spending time with the elderly inmates of Ashraya, she donated books covering mythology and religion to fiction and autobiographies.
Among others, eminent writer and columnist Dr Bibhuti Pattnaik, renowned writer Dash Benhur, writer and gynaecologist Dr Sarojini Sarangi, lyricist and writer Bijaya Malla, publisher Banoj Tripathy, writer and publisher Saroj Bal attended the function.
