Mahatma Gandhi :
Legend of Peace
Dr.Sulakshi Thelikorala
India’s Father of the Nation, Mahatma Gandhi’s 141st birthday is
commemorated on the 2nd of October 2010 all over the world as the
International day of Non-Violence and Peace. He was an eminent political
figure in India’s independence movement who pioneered towards a peaceful
end to centuries of British rule in India. Being one of the world’s most
famous pacifists, Gandhi has become the strongest symbol of non violence
in the 20th century.
Mahatma Gandhi |
Emulating a few great political leaders of all time, he has inspired
many across the globe with their freedom movements and protection of
civil rights.
Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was born to a devout Hindu family of
merchants on the 2nd of October 1869 in Porbandar, a coastal city of
present day Gujarat in Western India. His father, Karamchand Gandhi was
a chief of the state of Porbandar from whom the latter part of his name
was inherited. His mother, Putlibai Gandhi was a profound devotee of
Hinduism whose guidance on the religion and culture later influenced
Gandhi indelibly with his Ahimsa movement. His renowned first name
‘Mahatma’, resembling ‘Great Soul’ in Sanskrit was bestowed upon him by
Rabindranath Tagore as an honorary name during his struggle for
independence.
Young Gandhi
The young Mohandas attended the middle school in his home town
Porbandar and high school in Rajkoth.
The youth was an average student in his academic work on whom great
Indian epics left an ingrained impression than to any other child of the
same age. At the age of 13, Mohandas married Kasthurbai Makhanj from an
arranged child marriage keeping in with the regional customs and
traditions, from which Mohandas and Kasthurbai had four sons.
The legend’s patriotic feelings came into light when the youth
traveled to Britain to study law, a month shy from his 19th Birthday.
Breaking the family traditions, he joined the University College of
London to train himself as a barrister. During his stay in the Imperial
capital, he becomes interested in religion like never before, yet
adopting himself to English customs such as taking on dancing lessons.
It is during this short stay of 2 years when he is motivated to read
on civil disobedience, inspiring him on the principles of non violence.
Paying floral tribute to Gandhi’s statue |
Two days of becoming a barrister, the 21 year old returns to India to
find out that his mother has passed away while he was studying in London
which his family has kept away from him. Upon 2 years after returning,
Gandhi fails to establish a decent practice of law when he is forced to
leave India to Natal in South Africa on a one year job contract.
Retaliating discrimination
A chain of frustrating events in South Africa initiated the
transformation of a young expatriate lawyer into a national hero.
The most famous incident is when Gandhi was thrown off a train after
refusing to move from the first class to a third-class coach while
holding a valid first-class ticket.
From his first hand experience, Gandhi realizes the discrimination
faced by his fellow Indians in South Africa, which was another colony of
the British Emperor.
The racial discrimination starts to disturb the young barrister who
determines to fight against the injustice and grievances faced by the
Indians working in South Africa which lays the foundation to his
politics of peace protests. As a result, Mohandas leads his civil
disobedience campaigns where he is arrested several times like many
other great political leaders of all time.
The peaceful rebellion established the Natal Indian Congress and
adopts his still evolving methodology ‘sathyagraha’ for the very first
time in South Africa.
Despite the struggle, Gandhi becomes the first coloured lawyer to get
admitted to the South African Bar. He extends his intended one year
duration of stay to twenty long painstaking years solely to continue the
fight for the Indians in South Africa.
The legend
Mahatma Gandhi returns to India in 1914, after 20 years of peaceful
battle in South Africa against racial discrimination. Since then he is
determined to strive for the long awaited independence of his motherland
while and reconciliating of all races and classes in the multi ethnic
Indian Subcontinent.
Upon his return, the legend leads the newly found Indian National
Congress Party towards achieving independence.
The well known campaign led by Gandhi was the Salt March, the mass
protest in 1930 against the British Salt Monopoly where thousands of
Indians marched 200 miles to the Indian Ocean to make salt by
themselves. In 1947, India achieves their long awaited independence,
bringing an end to centuries of British rule.
Young Mohandas |
Even after gaining independence from the Imperial rule, Gandhi
continued his way forward with peaceful resistance to violence against
the racial discrimination and reconciliation of Hindus and Muslims which
ultimately leads to his tragic death.
On the 30th of January 1948, the 79 year old India’s Father of the
Nation was assassinated while he was walking to a platform from which he
was to address a prayer meeting.
The assassin was identified to be Nathuram Godse, a fellow Hindu
linked to an extremist Hindu movement who held Gandhi responsible for
weakening India by insisting upon a payment to Pakistan. Gandhi’s
martyrdom made him a greater symbol of peace. Today, his death is
commemorated in India as the Martyr Day to remember and appreciate those
who have given up their lives for the country.
In retrospect, it is indeed a mystery how this great Indian National
Leader has been missed in the Nobel Laureate list.
Nevertheless, he has been nominated to the Nobel Peace Prize five
times since 1937 to 1948, which was two days after his assassination.
In 1948, the year of his demise, neither a posthumous award was
awarded to Gandhi nor was anybody else given the award by the Norwegian
Nobel Committee, who later publicly declared its regret for such an
omission of a great leader whom they failed to appreciate.
The legend had been a celebrated figure in literature, film and
theater.
The 1982 movie ‘Gandhi’ portrayed by Ben Kinsley, which won the
Academy Award for the best picture has been a most popular production
based on the legend’s life.
Mahatma Gandhi has influenced many leaders across the world such a
Martin Luther King and James Lawson, who have drawn writings of Gandhi
in the development of their own theories about non violence.
Nelson Mandela, the great anti apartheid freedom fighter of South
Africa, was also influenced by Gandhi in his long walk to freedom who
was a follower of non violence resistance philosophy of Gandhi.
Mahatma Gandhi is a distinguished political leader due to his
principal ‘Ahimsa’ which pioneered India’s independence movement.
Although Gandhi was not the originator of the non violence principle,
he was the first to apply it in a political struggle.
Thus, his birthday on the 2nd of October is commemorated in India as
the Gandhi Jayanthi and worldwide as the International day of Non
Violence and Peace.
‘You can chain me, you can torture me, you can even destroy this
body, but you will never imprison my mind’ |