Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (Gujarati: ; Hindi:

[1] , pronounced: [mo rmt ( listen); 2 October 1869 30 January 1948) was the pre-eminent political and ideological leader of India during the Indian independence movement. Pioneering the use of non-violent resistance to tyrannical colonial rule through mass civil disobedience, saying, "I shall resist organized tyranny to the uttermost."[3] he developed a model to fight for civil rights and freedom that he called satyagraha. He founded his doctrine of nonviolent protest to achieve political and social progress based upon ahimsa, or total nonviolence for which he is internationally renowned.[4][5]

Gandhi led India to its independence and inspired movements for civil rights and freedom across the world.[6] Gandhi is often referred to as Mahatma (or "Great Soul," an honorific first applied to him by Rabindranath Tagore).[7] In India, he is also called Bapu (or "Father") and officially honoured as the Father of the Nation. His birthday, 2 October, is commemorated in India as Gandhi Jayanti, a national holiday, and worldwide as the International Day of Non-Violence. After earning a degree in law in 1891 from the University College London, Gandhi settled in South Africa to practice law, following some unsuccessful attempts to establish practice in India. Gandhi first employed non-violent 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 excessive land-tax and discrimination. Assuming leadership of the Indian National Congress in 1921, Gandhi led nationwide campaigns for easing poverty, expanding women's rights, building religious and ethnic amity, ending untouchability, increasing economic self-reliance, but above all for achieving Swarajthe independence of India from foreign domination. Gandhi famously led Indians in protesting 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 strove to practice non-violence 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 dhoti and shawl, woven with yarn he had hand spun on a charkha. He ate simple vegetarian food, and also undertook long fasts as means of both self-purification and social protest. Gandhi was assassinated on 30 January 1948, by Nathuram Godse, a Hindu nationalist who felt Gandhi was sympathetic to Muslims. January 30 is hence observed as Martyrs' Day in India.

Early life and background

Mahatma Gandhi in his earliest known photo, aged 7, c. 1876 Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi[8] was born on 2 October 1869[1] in Porbandar, a coastal town which was then part of the Bombay Presidency, British India.[9] He was born in his ancestral home, now known as Kirti Mandir.[10] His father, Karamchand Gandhi (18221885), who belonged to the Hindu Modh community, served as the diwan (a high official) of Porbander state, a small princely state in the Kathiawar Agency of British India.[10][11] His grandfather was Uttamchand Gandhi, also called Utta Gandhi.[10] His mother, Putlibai, who came from the Hindu Pranami Vaishnava community, was Karamchand's fourth wife, the first three wives having apparently died in childbirth.[12] Growing up with a devout mother and the Jain traditions of the region, the young Mohandas absorbed early the influences that would play an important role in his adult life including compassion for all forms of life, vegetarianism, fasting for selfpurification and mutual tolerance among individuals of different creeds.[13] The Indian classics, especially the stories of Shravana and Maharaja 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.[14][15] In May 1883, the 13-year-old Mohandas was married to 14-year-old Kasturbai Makhanji (her first name was usually shortened to "Kasturba", and affectionately to "Ba") in an arranged child marriage, according to the custom of the region.[16] In the process, he lost a year at school.[17] 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.[18] In 1885, when Gandhi was 15, the couple's first child was born, but

survived only a few days. Gandhi's father, Karamchand Gandhi, had also died earlier that year.[19] 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.[16] At his middle school in Porbandar and high school in Rajkot, Gandhi remained a mediocre student. He 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. He passed the matriculation exam at Samaldas College in Bhavnagar, Gujarat, with some difficulty. Gandhi's family wanted him to be a barrister as it would increase the prospects of succeeding to his father's post.[20]

English barrister

Gandhi and his wife Kasturba (1902) In 1888, Gandhi travelled to London, England, to study law at University College London where he studied Indian law and jurisprudence and to train as a barrister at the Inner Temple. His time in London, was influenced by a vow he had made to his mother upon leaving India, in the presence of a Jain monk, to observe the Hindu precepts of abstinence from meat and alcohol as well as of promiscuity.[21] Gandhi tried to adopt "English" customs, including taking dancing lessons for example. However, he could not appreciate the bland vegetarian food offered by his landlady and was frequently hungry until he found one of London's few vegetarian restaurants. Influenced by Henry Salt's writing, he joined the Vegetarian Society, was elected to its executive committee,[22] and started a local Bayswater chapter.[12] Some of the vegetarians he met were members of the Theosophical Society, which had been founded in 1875 to further universal brotherhood, and which was devoted to the study of Buddhist and Hindu literature. They encouraged Gandhi to join them in reading the Bhagavad Gita both in translation as well as in the original.[22] Not having shown interest in religion before, he became interested in religious thought. Gandhi was called to the bar in June 1891 and then left London for India, where he learned that his mother had died while he was in London and that his family had kept the news from him.[22] His attempts at establishing a law practice in Bombay failed because he was too shy to speak up in court. He returned to Rajkot to make a modest living drafting petitions for litigants but was forced to close it when he ran afoul of a British officer.[12][22] In 1893, he accepted a year-long

contract from Dada Abdulla & Co., an Indian firm, to a post in the Colony of Natal, South Africa, then part of the British Empire.[12]

Civil rights movement in South Africa (18931914)

Main article: Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi in South Africa

Gandhi in South Africa (1895) Gandhi spent 21 years in South Africa, where he developed his political views, ethics and political leadership skills. Indians in South Africa were led by wealthy Muslims, who employed Gandhi as a lawyer, and by impoverished Hindu indentured laborers 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.[23] In South Africa, Gandhi faced the discrimination directed at all coloured people. He was thrown off a train at Pietermaritzburg after refusing to move from the first-class. He protested and was allowed on first class the next day.[24] Travelling farther on by stagecoach, he was beaten by a driver for refusing to move to make room for a European passenger.[25] 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.
[26]

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. Gandhi extended his original period of stay in South Africa to assist Indians in opposing a bill to deny them the right to vote. 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,[12][24] 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 and he escaped only through the efforts of the wife of the police superintendent. He, however, 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.[12] 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 non-violent protest, for the first time. 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 non-violent 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 General Jan Christiaan Smuts to negotiate a compromise with Gandhi. Gandhi's ideas took shape, and the concept of satyagraha matured during this struggle.

Reactions to blacks

M.K. Gandhi while serving in the Ambulance Corps during the Boer War (1899) After the black majority came to power in South Africa, Gandhi was proclaimed a national hero with numerous monuments.[27] Gandhi focused his attention on Indians in South Africa, but historians have also examined his changing ideas on the proper role for blacks. White rule

enforced strict segregation among all races and generated conflict between these communities. At first Gandhi shared racial notions prevalent in the 1890s. Bhana and Vahed argue that Gandhi's experiences in jail sensitized him to the plight of blacks. "His negative views in the Johannesburg jail were reserved for hardened African prisoners rather than Africans generally."[28] In 1906, the British declared war against the Zulu kingdom in Natal. Gandhi actively encouraged the British to recruit Indians. He argued that Indians should support the war efforts in order to legitimise their claims to full citizenship. The British accepted Gandhi's offer to let a detachment of 20 Indians volunteer as a stretcher-bearer corps to treat wounded British soldiers. This corps was commanded by Gandhi and operated for less than two months.[29] The experience taught him it was hopeless to directly challenge the overwhelming military power of the British armyhe decided it could only be resisted in non-violent fashion by the pure of heart.[30]

Struggle for Indian Independence (191545)

See also: Indian independence movement In 1915, Gandhi returned to India permanently. He brought a reputation as a leading Indian nationalist, theorist and organizer. He joined the Indian National Congress and was introduced to Indian issues, politics and the Indian people primarily by Gopal Krishna Gokhale. Gokhale was a key leader of the Congress Party best known for his restraint and moderation, and his insistence on working inside the system. Gandhi took Gokhale's liberal approach based on British Whiggish traditions and transformed it to make it look wholly Indian.[31]

Role in World War I

Main article: World War I#The role of India In April 1918, during the latter part of World War I, the Viceroy invited Gandhi to a War Conference in Delhi.[32] Perhaps to show his support for the Empire and help his case for India's independence,[33] Gandhi agreed to actively recruit Indians for the war effort.[34] In contrast to the Zulu War of 1906 and the outbreak of World War I in 1914, when he recruited volunteers for the Ambulance Corps, this time Gandhi attempted to recruit combatants. In a June 1918 leaflet entitled "Appeal for Enlistment", Gandhi wrote "To bring about such a state of things we should have the ability to defend ourselves, that is, the ability to bear arms and to use them...If we want to learn the use of arms with the greatest possible despatch, it is our duty to enlist ourselves in the army."[35] He did, however, stipulate in a letter to the Viceroy's private secretary that he "personally will not kill or injure anybody, friend or foe." [36] Gandhi's war recruitment campaign brought into question his consistency on nonviolence as his friend Charlie Andrews confirms, "Personally I have never been able to reconcile this with his own conduct in other respects, and it is one of the points where I have found myself in painful disagreement."[37] Gandhi's private secretary also had acknowledged that "The question of the consistency between his creed of 'Ahimsa' (non-violence) and his recruiting campaign was raised not only then but has been discussed ever since."[34]

Champaran and Kheda

Main article: Champaran and Kheda Satyagraha

Gandhi in 1918, at the time of the Kheda and Champaran satyagrahas Gandhi's first major achievements came in 1918 with the Champaran and Kheda agitations of Bihar and Gujarat. The Champaran agitation pitted the local peasantry against their largely British landlords who were backed by the local administration. The peasantry was forced to grow Indigo, a cash crop whose demand had been declining over two decades, and were forced to sell their crops to the planters at a fixed price. Unhappy wIth this, the peasantry appealed to Gandhi at his ashram in Ahmedabad. Pursuing a strategy of non-violent protest, Gandhi took the administration by surprise and won concessions from the authorities.[38] In 1918, Kheda was hit by floods and famine and the peasantry was demanding relief from taxes. Gandhi moved his headquarters to Nadiad,[39] organising scores of supporters and fresh volunteers from the region, the most notable being Vallabhbhai Patel. [40] Using non-cooperation as a technique, Gandhi initiated a signature campaign where peasants pledged non-payment of revenue even under the threat of confiscation of land. A social boycott of mamlatdars and talatdars (revenue officials within the district) accompanied the agitation. Gandhi worked hard to win public support for the agitation across the country. For five months, the administration refused but finally in end-May 1918, the Government gave way on important provisions and relaxed the conditions of payment of revenue tax until the famine ended. In Kheda, Sardar Patel represented the farmers in negotiations with the British, who suspended revenue collection and released all the prisoners.