Ravi Shankar (spiritual Leader) - Peace and Humanitarian Work

Peace and Humanitarian Work

In the 1990s, Shankar initiated a number of humanitarian projects, which continue to this date under the auspices of the Art of Living Foundation and its numerous national organizations. In 1992 he started prison programs to rehabilitate prison inmates and help them reintegrate into the mainstream. 1997 saw the beginning of the International Association for Human Values, a humanitarian organization, and its 5H program, which aims to bring sustainable development to rural areas and revive human values. After the 2001 attack on the World Trade Center towers in New York City, the Art of Living Foundation offered free courses in stress reduction to New Yorkers. The Foundation ran relief programs in Kosovo for the war-ravaged population and for public health, university and UN personnel. The organization started an operation in occupied Iraq in 2003 aimed at relieving the stress of the Iraqi population, particularly the rising population of traumatized widows. A similar program was implemented in Afghanistan from 2003 to 2006 teaching war victims as well as UN and NGO personnel. In 2007, Shankar visited Iraq at the invitation of Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki and also met with Sunni, Shia and Kurdish leaders. He visited Pakistan in 2004 and met with political and religious leaders there as a part of his efforts to promote global peace. He is involved in interfaith dialogue and currently sits on the Board of World Religious Leaders for the Elijah Interfaith Institute. Many volunteers assisted the 2004 tsunami victims and Hurricane Katrina victims, in Haiti and many other regions of conflict and natural disaster. There is a prison stress management and rehabilitation techniques program, known as Prison SMART (Stress Management and Rehabilitation Training), which assists many prisoners and prison staff worldwide.

Shankar's education wing has set up 209 schools across 18 states of India. Many schools are established in rural-tribal areas with mostly first learners, often inaccessible by road. While speaking about the quality of education in government schools at a public event in Jaipur, March 2012, Shankar said that some government schools are the breeding grounds of Naxals. This was quoted out of context and there was considerable uproar in the media. Later, The Art of Living founder said that he has been misunderstood. "I said what I said, so I could encourage these private institutions to open up in more places. I just wanted to give some incentive to them to start up more educational institutions. I'm not that foolish that I would say that all government schools would breed Naxalites."