Mohandras Karamchand (Mahatma) Gandhi

National leader of India and promoter of nonviolence, b. 2 October 1869 (Porbandar, Gujarat, India), d. 30 January 1948 (Delhi).

Mohandras Karamchand Gandhi was the youngest child of Karamchand Gandhi and his fourth wife Putlibai. His father, chief minister of Porbandar, had learned the art to navigate between the feudal princes, the British colonial officers and the exploited people. His mother was a very religious person who visited the temple frequently and fastened regularly. Life at home was governed by Vaisnavism (worhsip of the Hindu god Vishnu) and Jainism, which teaches nonviolence and eternal existence of everything in the universe. The young Mohandras accepted ahimsa (noninjury to all living beings), became a vegetarian, fasted for self-purification and was raised in tolerance of other beliefs.

After an unremarkable period at primitive country schools and a brief phase of adolescent rebellion involving smoking, atheism and even eating meat, Gandhi managed to pass the entrance examination to the University of Bombay in 1887 and entered Samaldas College in Bhavnagar. Being barely able to understand English he had great difficulty following his classes. When his family, who wanted him to continue the tradition of keeping public office, suggested that he go to England to become a barrister, Mohandras eagerly prepared for - in his own words - the "land of philosophers and poets, the very centre of civilization." Vowing to his mother that he would not touch wine, women and meat while overseas and disregarding a ban of his own caste, who declared that a visit to England would violate Hindu religion, he sailed in 1888.

During the three years in London Gandhi learnt, not without pain, to defend his own values against those of imperial England. He became a member of the executive committee of the London Vegetarian Society and wrote for its journal.

Back in India in 1891 he could not establish himself in the legal profession, lived by drafting petitions for litigants and finally accepted an offer from a company for a one year posting in South Africa.

The South African experience changed Gandhi from a shy, withdrawn person into a powerful political campaigner. In court proceedings he was asked to remove his turban, refused and left. Travelling from Durban to Pretoria he was thrown out of first class and off the train, beaten up by a stage coach driver for refusing to make room for a European and continue his travel on the footboard, and denied accommodation in hotels "for Europeans only." In 1894 he was preparing his return to India when he read in a paper that a new bill was about to deprive Indians of their right to vote. Having just turned 25, Gandhi decided to stay and fight the bill. He founded the Natal Indian Congress and became its secretary.

During the next twenty years Gandhi's activity exposed South Africa's racial system to the world and developed his technique of satyagraha (devotion to truth): Rather than endure suffering under unjust laws you invite suffering by resisting the laws and exposing the enemy. At the same time Gandhi studied several religions extensively and concluded that all religions were true but none is perfect because they were not followed with true dedication and often interpreted wrongly. He was an advocate of the simple life; on two occasions he established a rural colony where he and his friends aimed at living from the fruit of manual labour.

Gandhi returned to India in 1914. He supported Great Britain during World War I but did not enter politics in any other way. In 1919 the colonial power planned to introduce prison without trial for people suspected to support independence. When Indian opposition did not achieve anything Gandhi announced a satyagraha campaign. The result was a massive explosion: Violent protests erupted everywhere, 379 Indians were killed by British troops while attending a meeting in Amritsar, and the colonial power declared martial law.

Gandhi now turned the 35 year old Indian National Congress (Party) from an upper middle-class organization into an instrument of liberation based on the rural masses, which promoted a byokott of anything British including schools, courts, offices and companies, in other words, unrestricted civil disobedience. By 1922 the movement had swept the country. Gandhi was arrested and sentenced to six years in prison. Released in 1924 he found the Congress Party split between those who wanted to cooperate with the British and those who opposed it. The unity of Hindu and Muslim India, which Gandhi had forged through action, had also dissolved, and communal violence was flaring up. At one stage Gandhi had to go through a three-week fast to stop communal violence. For several years Gandhi withdrew from politics.

In 1927 Britain appointed a constitutional reform commission, which had not a single Indian member. Gandhi moved at the 1928 meeting of the Congress Party a resolution that demanded dominion status within a year or a nation-wide satyagraha campaign for full independence. In 1930 he organized a march to the sea in protest against the salt tax. More than 60,000 people were arrested, but after one year making salt for personal use was permitted, and the British had to accept Gandhi as the sole representative of the National Congress in negotiations. In 1931 they imprisoned him, hoping thus to end his influence, but while in prison Gandhi took up a fast against an electoral law that included separate electorates for the caste of untouchables (the lowest of the working classes). The law was soon changed, but the campaign to end caste discrimination continued.

In 1934 Gandhi withdrew from politics, resigned from the Congress Party and returned to simple village life, teaching weaving, handspinning and other small industries that could improve village income. He returned to the public eye in the midst of World War II when the National Congress was prepared to join the British war effort on the promise of independence after the war. Gandhi demanded Britain's immediate withdrawal from India in 1942. Violence erupted and was brutally suppressed.

After these events Gandhi had little influence on the birth of India as a nation state. He was particularly distressed by the division into Hindu India and Muslim Pakistan and spent his time trying to console victims of sectarian violence and assist refugees. His last achievements were in 1947, when he ended rioting in Calcutta through fasting, and in 1948, when his fasting brought peace to Delhi. Days later he was shot by a Hindu fanatic.

Gandhi's role in politics often overshadows his true character. He was a man of religion and of philosophy applied to worldy problems, not a political leader. The British saw him as an unrealistic but dangerous dreamer, but for the Indian masses he was the Mahatma (the Great Soul). His actions energized the 20th century movements against colonialism, racism, and violence, and his name will have lasting influence. Britain acknowledged this by erecting a statue in his honour in 1969.

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