Gopal Ganesh Agarkar birth anniversary: All you need to know about Indian social reformer, educationist

Gopal Ganesh Agarkar was an Indian social reformer, educationist, and thinker from Maharashtra, India.

Agarkar was born on 14 July 1856 in Tembhu, a village in Karad taluk, Satara district, Maharashtra. He was a friend of Nilkanth Tidke.

Agarkar was schooled in Karad and then worked as a clerk in a court there. In 1878, he got his B. A. degree, and in 1880 was awarded an M.A.

He was the first editor of Kesari, a prominent Marathi-language weekly newspaper founded by Lokmanya Tilak in 1880-81. Ideological differences with Tilak caused him later to leave. They disagreed on the primacy of political reform versus social reform, with Agarkar believing that the need for social reform was more immediate.

He started his own periodical, Sudharak, in which he campaigned against the injustices of untouchability and the caste system. Agarkar abhorred blind adherence to and glorification of tradition and the past. He supported widow remarriage. From 1892 to 1895 he was the Principal of Ferguson college.

At one time a close associate of Bal Gangadhar Tilak, he was co-founder of multiple educational institutes such as the New English School, the Deccan Education Society and Fergusson College along with Tilak, Vishnushastri Chiplunkar, Mahadev Ballal Namjoshi, V. S. Apte, V. B. Kelkar, M. S. Gole and N. K. Dharap.

Agarkar suffered from severe asthma his entire life and succumbed to it on 17 June 1895.