Nationality Indian Other names L.C. Jain | Name Lakshmi Jain Role Writer | |
Born 13 December 1925 ( 1925-12-13 ) Bahadurpur, Rajasthan, India Occupation freedom fighter, cooperative leader Died November 14, 2010, New Delhi Books Civil Disobedience: Two Freedom Struggles, One Life | ||
Lakshmi Chand Jain (1925–2010) was a Gandhian activist and writer. In his youth, he participated briefly in the Indian freedom movement. Later, he served at various times as a member of the Planning Commission, as Indian High commissioner to South Africa, as a member of the World Commission on Dams (WCD) and as secretary of the Indian Cooperative Union and the All-India Handicrafts Board. He was awarded the 1989 Ramon Magsaysay Award for Public Service. In 2011, he was chosen posthumously for the second highest civilian award Padma Vibhushan by Government of India, but the family declined to accept the award since he had been against the concept of state honours.
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Biography
While yet in his youth, Jain took part in the Quit India movement (1942). During the partition of India (1947), he was put in charge of the refugee camp at Kingsway Camp in North Delhi. He helped introduce cooperative societies for farming and cottage industries into rehabilitation camps. As a volunteer organiser with the Indian Cooperative Union (ICU), he joined the rehabilitation project for refugees from Pakistan located in Faridabad, 20 km from Delhi.
Jain later helped Kamaladevi Chattopadhyay organise the Indian Cooperative Union and applied its principles to the handicrafts industry. As secretary of the All-India Handicrafts Board, he fostered decentralised production and directed training, technical services, and loans to India's struggling self-employed spinners, weavers, carpenters, and metalsmiths. He applied modern marketing techniques to promote handicrafts sales abroad and organised the Central Cottage Industries Emporium to expand the market at home. He championed artisans against mechanisation and mass production, helping millions of independent craftsmen carry on traditional livelihoods in security and pride and assured the survival of precious arts and skills.
Jain became an expert on development, applying unique organizational skills to wed theory to practice. In 1966 he led the establishment of a chain of consumer cooperative stores where those living in cities could buy food, clothing, and tools at a fair price. In 1968 he co-founded a service-oriented consulting firm. By seeking the advice of farmers and workers, Jain and his like-minded colleagues helped government, industry, and nongovernmental organisations (NGOs) design modernisation projects that were relevant and effective.
Jain worked with and on a number of development agencies as well as government committees and boards, such as the United Nations' World Dam Commission As part of the ICU, he helped set up the Central Cottage Industries Emporium and Super Bazaar cooperative stores.
Jain's wife was the economist Devaki Jain; the couple had two sons and settled in Bangalore. In 1989, Jain received the Ramon Magsaysay Award for Public Service, for "his informed and selfless commitment to attack India's poverty at the grass-roots level".