Mumbai: Founder of Swadhyaya Parivar, social thinker and philosopher, Pandurang Shastri Athavale, passed away at his residence on October 25 afternoon following a cardiac attack.

Athavale, 84, is survived by his wife and daughter

He was presented with the Ramon Magsaysay Award for community leadership in 1996 and the $ 1.2 million Templeton Award in 1997.

Founder of the 'Swadhyaya Movement', the movement to discover inner-self, Athavale is revered in Maharashtra and Gujarat as a modern day thinker and a social reformer.

Athavale, also a recipient of Padma Vibhushan, strived throughout his life to fight inequality, casteism in the society and vices among the cultivating and fishermen communities in the two states.

The Swadhyaya movement has a following among millions of people from weaker sections in the two states, largely among the weaker sections like harijans, fishermen and the backward caste Vaghris.

PTI