Jimmy Carter in Patan village on Monday. (AP)

Lonavala, Oct. 30: Brad Pitt swapped babies for bricks today, laying the building block for a home being built as part of a Jimmy Carter project aimed at providing decent and affordable housing for low-income families.

Since he arrived early this month in Pune with Angelina Jolie for the filming of A Mighty Heart, a film on the life and death of US journalist Daniel Pearl, the Hollywood hunk has rarely been seen without his partner, often carrying one of their three children around.

(From top) Brad Pitt, Steve Waugh and Pooja Bedi lend a helping hand to the Jimmy Carter Project. (AP/PTI)

Jolie is playing Pearl’s wife Mariane, on whose book the film is based. Michael Winterboom is the director and Pitt a part-producer of the movie, whose shooting is taking place in a bungalow at Aundh, on the fringes of Pune.

Brad, without Angelina and the kids, joined over 2,000 volunteers today from the US, South America, Europe, India and Asia to lay the building blocks for the first of the 100 houses to be erected by the former US President’s project.

The Habitat for Humanity International, which runs the annual Carter project, has been in India for the past 22 years. It has built and renovated homes in tsunami-affected areas.

“Every person who is part of this project will be enriched this week by working with Habitat partner-families who are helping to improve their lives and the lives of others in the community,” said Jonathan Reckford, CEO of Habitat, acknowledging the support of celebrities. Diana Hayden, Pooja Bedi and Steve Waugh were also present, but all the attention was clearly riveted on Brad.

Brangelina’s philanthropy is, perhaps, as famous as their pairing. Last month, they announced a $2-million donation to Global Action For Children and Medicines sans Frontiers. After the birth of their daughter Shiloh, the stars gave away $3,00,000 to Namibian hospitals and another $15,000 to a community group there. The $4.1 million received for the first published photos of their new-born also went to charity.

“While we celebrate the joy of the birth of our daughter, we recognise that two million babies born every year in the developing world die on the first day of their lives,” the couple had said in a statement released in June this year.

Not far from Lonavala, the shooting of the film rolled on in Pune. Brangelina are yet to meet the media on a formal basis, and their reluctance to be photographed has sparked rumours that they are planning to sell pictures of their Indian jaunt, the proceeds of which will be given to charities of their choice.

They are also rumoured to have adopted an Indian boy from an adoption centre in Pune and named him ‘India’, although there has been no confirmation of this so far.

With an estimated wealth of $150 million and a purse open for charities the world over, many are keeping their fingers crossed on which one in India catches their fancy.