Mahatma Gandhi

Mahatma Gandhi

Born

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi

2 October 1869
Porbandar, Kathiawar Agency,British India[1]

Died

30 January 1948 (aged 78)

New Delhi, Delhi, India

Cause of death

Assassination by shooting

Resting place

Cremated at Rajghat, Delhi

28.6415N 77.2483E

Other names

Mahatma Gandhi, Bapu, Gandhiji

Ethnicity

Gujarati

Education

barrister-at-law

Alma mater

Alfred High School, Rajkot,

Samaldas College, Bhavnagar,
University College, London(UCL)

Known for

Leadership of Indian independence movement,

philosophy of Satyagraha,Ahimsa or nonviolence,
pacifism

Movement

Indian National Congress

Religion

Hinduism, with Jain influences

Spouse(s)

Kasturba Gandhi

Children

Harilal
Manilal
Ramdas
Devdas

Parent(s)

Putlibai Gandhi (Mother)

Karamchand Gandhi (Father)

Signature

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was the preeminent leader of the Indian independence
movement in British-ruled India. Employing nonviolent civil disobedience, Gandhi led India to
independence and inspired movements for civil rights and freedom across the world.
The honorific Mahatma (Sanskrit: "high-souled", "venerable")[3])applied to him first in 1914 in South
Africa,[4]is now used worldwide. He is also called Bapu (Gujarati: endearment for "father",[5] "papa"[5]
[6]
) in India.
Born and raised in a Hindu merchant caste family in coastal Gujarat, western India, and trained in
law at the Inner Temple, London, Gandhi first employed nonviolent civil disobedience as an
expatriate lawyer in South Africa, in the resident Indian community's struggle for civil rights. After his
return to India in 1915, he set about organising peasants, farmers, and urban labourers to protest
against excessive land-tax and discrimination. Assuming leadership of theIndian National
Congress in 1921, Gandhi led nationwide campaigns for easing poverty, expanding women's rights,

building religious and ethnic amity, ending untouchability, but above all for achieving Swaraj or selfrule.
Gandhi famously led Indians in challenging the British-imposed salt tax with the 400 km
(250 mi) Dandi Salt March in 1930, and later in calling for the British to Quit India in 1942. He was
imprisoned for many years, upon many occasions, in both South Africa and India. Gandhi attempted
to practise nonviolence and truth in all situations, and advocated that others do the same. He lived
modestly in a self-sufficient residential community and wore the traditional Indian dhotiand shawl,
woven with yarn hand-spun on a charkha. He ate simple vegetarian food, and also undertook long
fasts as a means of both self-purification and social protest.
Gandhi's vision of an independent India based on religious pluralism, however, was challenged in
the early 1940s by a new Muslim nationalism which was demanding a separate Muslim homeland
carved out of India.[7] Eventually, in August 1947, Britain granted independence, but the British Indian
Empire[7] was partitioned into two dominions, a Hindu-majority India and Muslim Pakistan.[8] As many
displaced Hindus, Muslims, and Sikhs made their way to their new lands, religious violence broke
out, especially in the Punjab and Bengal. Eschewing the official celebration of independence in
Delhi, Gandhi visited the affected areas, attempting to provide solace. In the months following, he
undertook several fasts unto death to promote religious harmony. The last of these, undertaken on
12 January 1948 at age 78,[9] also had the indirect goal of pressuring India to pay out some cash
assets owed to Pakistan. [9] Some Indians thought Gandhi was too accommodating. [9][10] Nathuram
Godse, a Hindu nationalist, assassinated Gandhi on 30 January 1948 by firing three bullets into his
chest at point-blank range.[10]
Indians widely describe Gandhi as the father of the nation.[11][12] His birthday, 2 October, is
commemorated as Gandhi Jayanti, a national holiday, and world-wide as the International Day of
Nonviolence.

Early life and background

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi in his earliest known photo, aged 7, c. 1876

Mohandas

Karamchand

Gandhi[13] was

born

on

October

1869[1] to

a Hindu Modh Baniya family[14] in Porbandar (also known asSudamapuri), a coastal town

on

the Kathiawar Peninsula and then part of the small princely state of Porbandar in the Kathiawar
Agency of the Indian Empire. His father, Karamchand Uttamchand Gandhi (18221885), served as
the diwan (chief minister) of Porbandar state.
The Gandhi family originated from the village of Kutiana in what was then Junagadh State.[15] In the
late 17th or early 18th century, one Lalji Gandhi moved to Porbandar and entered the service of its
ruler, the Rana. Successive generations of the family served as civil servants in the state
administration before Uttamchand, Mohandas's grandfather, became diwan in the early 19th century
under the then Rana of Porbandar, Khimojiraji. [15][16] In 1831, Rana Khimojiraji died suddenly and was
succeeded by his 12-year-old only son, Vikmatji. [16] As a result, Rana Khimojirajji's widow, Rani
Rupaliba, became Regent for her son. She soon fell out with Uttamchand and forced him to return to
his ancestral village in Junagadh. While in Junagadh, Uttamchand appeared before its Nawab and
saluted him with his left hand instead of his right, replying that his right hand was pledged to
Porbandar's service.[15] In 1841, Vikmatji assumed the throne and reinstated Uttamchand as
his diwan.
In 1847, Rana Vikmatji appointed Uttamchand's son, Karamchand, as diwan after disagreeing with
Uttamchand over the state's maintenance of a British garrison. [15] Although he only had an
elementary education and had previously been a clerk in the state administration, Karamchand
proved a capable chief minister.[17] During his tenure, Karamchand married four times. His first two
wives died young, after each had given birth to a daughter, and his third marriage was childless. In
1857, Karamchand sought his third wife's permission to remarry; that year, he married Putlibai
(18441891), who also came from Junagadh, [15] and was from aPranami Vaishnava family.[18][19][20]
[21]

Karamchand and Putlibai had three children over the ensuing decade, a son, Laxmidas (c. 1860

March 1914), a daughter, Raliatbehn (18621960) and another son, Karsandas (c. 18661913). [22][23]
On 2 October 1869, Putlibai gave birth to her last child, Mohandas, in a dark, windowless groundfloor room of the Gandhi family residence in Porbandar city. As a child, Gandhi was described by his
sister Raliat as "restless as mercury...either playing or roaming about. One of his favourite pastimes
was

twisting

dogs'

ears."[24]The

Indian

classics,

especially

the

stories

of Shravana and

king Harishchandra, had a great impact on Gandhi in his childhood. In his autobiography, he admits
that they left an indelible impression on his mind. He writes: "It haunted me and I must have acted
Harishchandra to myself times without number." Gandhi's early self-identification with truth and love
as supreme values is traceable to these epic characters. [25][26]
The family's religious background was eclectic. Gandhi's father was Hindu[27] and his mother was
from a Pranami Vaishnava family. Religious figures were frequent visitors to the home. [28] Gandhi was

deeply influenced by his mother Putlibai, an extremely pious lady who "would not think of taking her
meals without her daily prayers...she would take the hardest vows and keep them without flinching.
To keep two or three consecutive fasts was nothing to her." [29]
In the year of Mohandas's birth, Rana Vikmatji was exiled, stripped of direct administrative power
and demoted in rank by the British political agent, after having ordered the brutal executions of a
slave and an Arab bodyguard. Possibly as a result, in 1874 Karamchand left Porbandar for the
smaller state of Rajkot, where he became a counsellor to its ruler, the Thakur Sahib; though Rajkot
was a less prestigious state than Porbandar, the British regional political agency was located there,
which gave the state's diwan a measure of security.[30] In 1876, Karamchand became diwan of Rajkot
and was succeeded as diwan of Porbandar by his brother Tulsidas. His family then rejoined him in
Rajkot.[31]
On 21 January 1879, Mohandas entered the local taluk (district) school in Rajkot, not far from his
home. At school, he was taught the rudiments of arithmetic, history, the Gujarati language and
geography.[31] Despite being only an average student in his year there, in October 1880 he sat the
entrance examinations for Kathiawar High School, also in Rajkot. He passed the examinations with a
creditable average of 64 percent and was enrolled the following year. [32] During his years at the high
school, Mohandas intensively studied the English language for the first time, along with continuing
his lessons in arithmetic, Gujarati, history and geography.[32] His attendance and marks remained
mediocre to average, possibly due to Karamchand falling ill in 1882 and Mohandas spending more
time at home as a result.[32] Gandhi shone neither in the classroom nor on the playing field. One of
the terminal reports rated him as "good at English, fair in Arithmetic and weak in Geography; conduct
very good, bad handwriting".
While at high school, Mohandas came into contact with students of other castes and faiths, including
several Parsis and Muslims. A Muslim friend of his elder brother Karsandas, named Sheikh Mehtab,
befriended Mohandas and encouraged the strictly vegetarian boy to try eating meat to improve his
stamina. He also took Mohandas to a brothel one day, though Mohandas "was struck blind and
dumb in this den of vice," rebuffed the prostitutes' advances and was promptly sent out of the
brothel. As experimenting with meat-eating and carnal pleasures only brought Mohandas mental
anguish, he abandoned both and the company of Mehtab, though they would maintain their
association for many years afterwards.[33]
In May 1883, the 13-year-old Mohandas was married to 14-year-old Kasturbai Makhanji
Kapadia (her first name was usually shortened to "Kasturba", and affectionately to "Ba") in
an arranged child marriage, according to the custom of the region. [34] In the process, he lost a year at
school.[35] Recalling the day of their marriage, he once said, "As we didn't know much about
marriage, for us it meant only wearing new clothes, eating sweets and playing with relatives."

However, as was prevailing tradition, the adolescent bride was to spend much time at her parents'
house, and away from her husband. [36] Writing many years later, Mohandas described with regret the
lustful feelings he felt for his young bride, "even at school I used to think of her, and the thought of
nightfall and our subsequent meeting was ever haunting me."[37]
In late 1885, Karamchand died, on a night when Mohandas had just left his father to sleep with his
wife, despite the fact she was pregnant. [38] The couple's first child was born shortly after, but survived
only a few days. The double tragedy haunted Mohandas throughout his life, "the shame, to which I
have referred in a foregoing chapter, was this of my carnal desire even at the critical hour of my
father's death, which demanded wakeful service. It is a blot I have never been able to efface or
forget...I was weighed and found unpardonably wanting because my mind was at the same moment
in the grip of lust. [38][39] Mohandas and Kasturba had four more children, all sons: Harilal, born in
1888; Manilal, born in 1892; Ramdas, born in 1897; and Devdas, born in 1900.[34]
In November 1887, he sat the regional matriculation exams in Ahmedabad, writing exams in
arithmetic, history, geography, natural science, English and Gujarati. He passed with an overall
average of 40 percent, ranking 404th of 823 successful matriculates. [40] In January 1888, he enrolled
at Samaldas College in Bhavnagar State, then the sole degree-granting institution of higher
education in the region. During his first and only term there, he suffered from headaches and strong
feelings of homesickness, did very poorly in his exams in April and withdrew from the college at the
end of the term, returning to Porbandar.[41]

Civil rights activist in South Africa (18931914)

Gandhi in South Africa (1895)

Gandhi was 24 when he arrived in South Africa [49] to work as a legal representative for the Muslim
Indian Traders based in the city of Pretoria. [50] He spent 21 years in South Africa, where he developed
his political views, ethics and political leadership skills.[citation needed]

Indians in South Africa were led by wealthy Muslims, who employed Gandhi as a lawyer, and by
impoverished Hindu indentured labourers with very limited rights. Gandhi considered them all to be
Indians, taking a lifetime view that "Indianness" transcended religion and caste. He believed he
could bridge historic differences, especially regarding religion, and he took that belief back to India
where he tried to implement it. The South African experience exposed handicaps to Gandhi that he
had not known about. He realised he was out of contact with the enormous complexities of religious
and cultural life in India, and believed he understood India by getting to know and leading Indians in
South Africa.[51]
In South Africa, Gandhi faced the discrimination directed at all coloured people. He was thrown off a
train at Pietermaritzburgafter refusing to move from the first-class. He protested and was allowed on
first class the next day.[52] Travelling farther on by stagecoach, he was beaten by a driver for refusing
to move to make room for a European passenger.[53] He suffered other hardships on the journey as
well, including being barred from several hotels. In another incident, the magistrate of a Durban court
ordered Gandhi to remove his turban, which he refused to do.[54]
These events were a turning point in Gandhi's life and shaped his social activism and awakened him
to social injustice. After witnessing racism, prejudice and injustice against Indians in South Africa,
Gandhi began to question his place in society and his people's standing in the British Empire.[55]

Gandhi with the stretcher-bearers of the Indian Ambulance Corps

Gandhi extended his original period of stay in South Africa to assist Indians in opposing a bill to deny
them the right to vote. He asked Joseph Chamberlain, the British Colonial Secretary, to reconsider
his position on this bill.[50] Though unable to halt the bill's passage, his campaign was successful in
drawing attention to the grievances of Indians in South Africa. He helped found the Natal Indian
Congress in 1894,[20][52] and through this organisation, he moulded the Indian community of South
Africa into a unified political force. In January 1897, when Gandhi landed in Durban, a mob of white
settlers attacked him[56]and he escaped only through the efforts of the wife of the police
superintendent. However, he refused to press charges against any member of the mob, stating it
was one of his principles not to seek redress for a personal wrong in a court of law.[20]

In 1906, the Transvaal government promulgated a new Act compelling registration of the colony's
Indian population. At a mass protest meeting held in Johannesburg on 11 September that year,
Gandhi adopted his still evolving methodology of Satyagraha (devotion to the truth), or nonviolent
protest, for the first time.[57] He urged Indians to defy the new law and to suffer the punishments for
doing so. The community adopted this plan, and during the ensuing seven-year struggle, thousands
of Indians were jailed, flogged, or shot for striking, refusing to register, for burning their registration
cards or engaging in other forms of nonviolent resistance. The government successfully repressed
the Indian protesters, but the public outcry over the harsh treatment of peaceful Indian protesters by
the South African government forced South African leader Jan Christiaan Smuts, himself a
philosopher, to negotiate a compromise with Gandhi. Gandhi's ideas took shape, and the concept
of Satyagraha matured during this struggle.

Assassination

Memorial at the former Birla House, New Delhi, where Gandhi was assassinated at 5:17 pm on 30 January
1948 on his way to a prayer meeting. Stylised footsteps are shown leading to the memorial.

Mohandas

Karamchand

Gandhi

was

assassinated

in

the

garden

of

the

former Birla

House (now Gandhi Smriti) at 5:17 pm on 30 January 1948. Accompanied by his grandnieces,
Gandhi was on his way to address a prayer meeting, when his assassin, Nathuram Godse, fired
three bullets from a Beretta 9 mm pistol into his chest at point-blank range. [140] Godse was a Hindu
nationalist with links to the extremist Hindu Mahasabha, who held Gandhi guilty of favouring
Pakistan and strongly opposed the doctrine of nonviolence. [141] Godse and his co-conspirator were
tried and executed in 1949. Gandhi's memorial (or Samdhi) at Rj Ght, New Delhi, bears the
epigraph "H Ram" (Devanagari: ! or, He Rm), which may be translated as "Oh God". These
are widely believed to be Gandhi's last words after he was shot, though the veracity of this statement
has been disputed.[142] Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru addressed the nation through radio: [143]
Friends and comrades, the light has gone out of our lives, and there is darkness everywhere, and I
do not quite know what to tell you or how to say it. Our beloved leader, Bapu as we called him, the
father of the nation, is no more. Perhaps I am wrong to say that; nevertheless, we will not see him
again, as we have seen him for these many years, we will not run to him for advice or seek solace

from him, and that is a terrible blow, not only for me, but for millions and millions in this country.
Jawaharlal Nehru's address to Gandhi[144]
Gandhi's death was mourned nationwide. Over two million people joined the five-mile long funeral
procession that took over five hours to reach Raj Ghat from Birla house, where he was
assassinated. Gandhi's body was transported on a weapons carrier, whose chassis was dismantled
overnight to allow a high-floor to be installed so that people could catch a glimpse of his body. The
engine of the vehicle was not used; instead four drag-ropes manned by 50 people each pulled the
vehicle.[145] All Indian-owned establishments in London remained closed in mourning as thousands of
people from all faiths and denominations and Indians from all over Britain converged at India
House in London.[146]
While India mourned and communal (inter-religious) violence escalated, there were calls for
retaliation, and even an invasion of Pakistan by the Indian army. Nehru and Patel, the two strongest
figures in the government and in Congress, had been pulling in opposite directions; the
assassination pushed them together. They agreed the first objective must be to calm the hysteria.
[147]

They called on Indians to honour Gandhi's memory and even more his ideals. [148] They used the

assassination to consolidate the authority of the new Indian state. The government made sure
everyone knew the guilty party was not a Muslim. Congress tightly controlled the epic public displays
of grief over a two-week periodthe funeral, mortuary rituals and distribution of the martyr's ashes
as millions participated and hundreds of millions watched. The goal was to assert the power of the
government and legitimise the Congress Party's control. This move built upon the massive
outpouring of Hindu expressions of grief. The government suppressed the RSS, the Muslim National
Guards, and the Khaksars, with some 200,000 arrests. Gandhi's death and funeral linked the distant
state with the Indian people and made more understand why religious parties were being
suppressed during the transition to independence for the Indian people. [149]

Ashes
By Hindu tradition the ashes were to be spread on a river. Gandhi's ashes were poured into urns
which were sent across India for memorial services. [150] Most were immersed at the Sangam at
Allahabad on 12 February 1948, but some were secretly taken away. In 1997, Tushar
Gandhi immersed the contents of one urn, found in a bank vault and reclaimed through the courts, at
the Sangam at Allahabad. [151][152] Some of Gandhi's ashes were scattered at the source of the Nile
River nearJinja, Uganda, and a memorial plaque marks the event. On 30 January 2008, the contents
of another urn were immersed at Girgaum Chowpatty. Another urn is at the palace of the Aga
Khan in Pune[151] (where Gandhi had been imprisoned from 1942 to 1944) and another in the SelfRealization Fellowship Lake Shrine in Los Angeles.[153]