VILNIUS: A schoolteacher here is now spearheading a movement to immortalise the friendship between Mahatma Gandhi and Jewish architect Hermann Kallenbach in stone.
Vytautas Toleikis who teaches ethics has now joined hands with eminent Lithuanian sculptor Romas Kvintas to make a life size bronze statue of the two historic figures in Rusne where Kallenbach was born.
Vytautas was mesmerized by Gandhi’s philosophy after watching a film on him. It was during this that he stumbled upon Kallenbach. A student of Jewish history, Vytautas went around researching Kallenbach’s past and found that he was born in Lithuania – a country that was greatly inspired by Gandhi’s doctrine of non-violence during their own struggle against Russian invasion and occupation.
Vytautas then decided to make this historical friendship between the two historical characters public through a statue.
