Mahatma Gandhi, our Father of the Nation was one of the brightest
luminaries of Non-Violence, Truth & Peaceful Resistance and Humanism not
only in India but in the rest of the world. Born in 2nd October,
1869 to Karamchand and Putlibai Gandhi in Porbandar, Gujarat, he was named as
Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi in his childhood. A frank, fearless and honest young
lad he did his schooling in Porbandar and then in nearby Rajkot. He was sent to
study Law in England and joined as Barrister in 1891. There too he abstained
from alcohol, meat very vigorously.
Two
years later in 1893, he moved on to South Africa to fight a legal suit for a Gujrati merchant there. He was thrown out of the train in Peitermaritzburg for
the colour of his skin despite having a valid first-class ticket for his seat.
This was his first encounter with
apartheid and racial discrimination. It was
just a small instance of what was prevalent then in South Africa towards the black,
brown or non-white people. This shook him and made him struggle against the
colonial rule there. He participated, organised in activities opposing the laws
for the blacks and the Indians there that made them unequal in almost matters of
life like employment, land or agriculture, marriages, social and political
rights etc. He was successful in not only uniting people for their cause but also
helping change some of the laws existing at that time. He set up the Pheonix
Farm to shelter homeless and sick people and often took care of them himself. Upon
his return to India in 1915, he was appalled at the British colonial slavery,
misery, poverty, discrimination and the atrocities on the people.
He decided to join the India’s freedom struggle and not pursue his legal
career. He regarded Gopal Krishna Gokhale as his Guru under whose guide he got
the path and zeal for the struggle for India’s freedom. Initially he fought for
the rights of the labourers and farmers. His first peaceful and non-violent
struggle bore fruit in Champaran, Bihar when he made the administration change
the rules on profit from Poppy cultivation and the heavy taxations on it. Later
he organised many peaceful and non-violent
protests and agitations like the
Civil Disobedience Movement, Non-cooperation movement, the Dandi March against
salt tax, Swadeshi movement for the boycott of foreign goods, Khilafat
movement, Quit India movement etc. His method was to protest for one’s rights
by defeating the mighty British government by the force of the powerful will without
resorting to physical force, till the last. That is, he alongwith the freedom
fighters continued receiving the lathis, sticks and bullets of the
government then without forcibly hitting back. By this he compelled the
government to concede to many of their demands. He wanted to break the morale
of the oppressive rulers by non-violently receiving their punishments.
Satyagraha-as he called it was a struggle for truth. According to him
this satyagraha or the pursuit of truth was essential for an individual, a nation
or a struggle to powerfully move towards its destined goals and place. Ahimsa
or non-violence was the best path accordingly in satyagraha.Ahimsa or
non-violence was a means to defeat an enemy from the core rather than
physically. It was a weapon readily available as well one that
could unite the
Indian masses fight against the mighty British. He experimented with all his
principles – satyagraha, ahimsa and all. Both, he said were sides of the same concept.
He managed to get back the rights of the people with these principles very
efficiently. His idea of non-violent or passive resistance inspired freedom
fighters all over the world from Nelson Mandela, Martin Luther King, South East
Asia’s and African freedom movements and many others.
