Pravin Patkar is an Indian academic, social scientist, writer and human rights activist. He co-founded Prerana, an NGO globally recognized for its initiatives in child protection & anti-human trafficking. In 1999, he founded Asia's first Anti-Human Trafficking Resource Centre supported by the US Government. He has served as an expert on several national and international agencies working in the anti-human trafficking sector. He has been in the teaching profession for over 40 years in both formal and non-formal education sectors. He has written books, published articles and created PSAs to prevent organized violence against women & children.
Personal life
Pravin Patkar was born in Mumbai. He completed his PhD in Social Provisioning in Prostitution from Mumbai University. He is married to social activist Priti Patkar.
Teaching
Pravin Patkar has been in the teaching profession for the past 40 years. He was part of the teaching faculty at TISS Mumbai for 20 years teaching social work and guiding research. He took voluntary retirement in 1995 as associate professor. He is currently adjunct teaching as a professor at Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham in Ettimadai, Coimbatore. Patkar began a migrating education system and managed a residential school for children of tribes in bonded labor for 25 years.
Activism
He fought against tribal bondage and environmental destruction in the ecologically sensitive Western Ghats through a platform named Pariwartan-84. He closed down illegal activity and rehabilitated 70,000 families of seasonally migrant tribes.
Under Prerana, he initiated comprehensive 24–7 field action to protect children born in red light districts from second generation trafficking into the sex trade.
He fought for drought-affected paddy cultivators of the backwater zones of Coastal Maharashtra, initiating a Kharland Development programme with the help of European Union.
Planning Commission - Development Impact of Irrigation Schemes under the Employment Guarantee Scheme: Irrigation Systems, A Cost Benefit Analysis
International Labour Organization- Labour Market Analysis & Monitoring.
International Rice Research Institute, Manila – Technological Infusion and Employment of Women in Rice Cultivation: A Study in Agro-Economics.
Board of Research Studies, TISS- Tribal Bondage, Migration, and Environmental Destruction.
Planning Department Government of Maharashtra– Study of Bonded Labor System in the State of Maharashtra.
UNESCAP and Association of Schools of Social Work in India Working with the Poor: Social Intervention in Disadvantaged Groups
Grouppe Development France, South Asia Office- Case Study on Indo-Bangladesh Cross Border Trafficking of Children
UNICEF Maharashtra- Six District Study of The Situation of Trafficking of Children and Children of Victims of Trafficking.
UNICEF New Delhi- Nine Case Studies of Organizations Working Against Child Trafficking in the State of Maharashtra.
National Commission for Women India- A Legal Study of Anti Trafficking Legislation in India.
Commonwealth Foundation, U.K.- Water Conservation & Management: A Case Study on Sustainable Development
Terre des Hommes, Germany- - Project Evaluation.
World Bank- Agricultural Wages Disaggregation of Regional Level Data. A Quantitative Analysis
Recognition In August 2018 Power Brands awarded Dr. Pravin Patkar the Bharatiya Manavata Vikas Puraskar for his nation-building initiatives through “Prerana” and fighting the good fight against human trafficking, protecting thousands of women and children and rehabilitating several hundred of them and for being a guardian angel and change-maker for women of all ages, who are victims of sex trade and trafficking.
