Inspiration behind 'Swades'

After viewing the Bollywood blockbuster movie 'Swades', about a NASA engineer who searches for his roots in his homeland, I was curious to find out the sources that inspired this movie. In the movie's credits, the director quotes that this movie was based on a book by Mahatma Gandhi (I don't remember the name now). I have also heard that Swades is based on some real life stories of some US-based Indian engineers who return to India and try to change things at the grass root level. My web research gave me some other results though. This movie seems to be based on a novel by Dr. Shivaram Karanth ( a Jnanapeet award winner for his novel 'Mookajjiya kanasugalu' (Dreams of a mute grandmom)). The novel on which the movie is based on is 'Chigurida Kanasu' (A Sprouted Dream). The novel is set in the 1960s in India, where a person working in Delhi comes to his native village in the scenic South Kanara district of coastal Karnataka to meet his grandmom's sister who lives there. He ends up getting attached to the place and the people. In fact, he even constructs a dam and generates electricity with the help of the locals residing in the village. In 2003, the Kannada director Nagabharana made this novel into a movie by the same name, starring Shivaraj Kumar. The irony is that Swades made more box-office collections in Karnataka than the Kannada counterpart 'Chigurida Kanasu' :)

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