Tagore's Ideas of Social Action and the Sriniketan Experiment of Rural Reconstruction, 1922–41

Rabindranath Tagore's Institute for Rural Reconstruction based at Sriniketan was pioneering in its time and the culmination of his long period of endeavour to redeem the neglected Indian village and bridge the gap between the city and the village. He had two objectives: to educate the villagers in self-reliance and to bring back to the villages 'life in its completeness' with 'music and readings from the epics,' as in the 'past.' He recruited a stellar team of agronomists, rural health workers, and village-level teachers – notably Leonard Elmhirst from England and his own son, Rathindranath Tagore – who initiated many of the more successful elements basic to rural development work.