Mahatma Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (2 October 1869-30 January 1948) was the leader of the Indian independence movement and the leader of the Indian National Congress (INC) party. Gandhi became involved with the protest movement in South Africa in 1894, and he returned to India in 1915 to become involved with the Indian nationalist movement. Gandhi was best known for his nonviolent satyagraha campaigns, which led to the British being forced to grant the Indians concessions. Gandhi's influence declined after India was granted its independence in 1947, as he was focused on defiance instead of politics. In January 1948, he was assassinated by the Hindu radical Nathuram Godse for his benevolence towards Muslims.
Biography[]
Rise to prominence[]
Gandhi as a lawyer in South Africa
Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was born in Porbanda, Gujarat, British India on 2 October 1869 to a well-to-do Hindu family from a trader caste. He read for the Bar in London from 1888 to 1889 despite his lack of a university education, and his first years as a lawyer in Bombay were not as eventful. In 1893, he was sent to Natal in South Africa to help in the case of an Indian client, and he was motivated to join the protest movement against the disenfranchisement and the withdrawal of civil rights of the Asian immigrant community after being thrown off of a train for sitting in a "whites-only" carriage. He became a leader of the proitests for the next two decades, developing the basis of his political and philosophical consciousness. Gandhi believed in the "inner voice" present within each individual, which was the voice of God, and he claimed that truth could only be obtained by listening to the inner voice through focusing on oneself and ignoring corrupt outside influences. He began an austere life marked by chastity, simplicity, and hours spent on the spinning wheel in an attempt to return to his Indian roots and defy Western textiles. His political beliefs were founded upon religious tolerance, non-violence, and intense cultural nationalism hostile to the imposition of values and cultures on foreign people; however, he adopted Gopal Krishna Gokhale's liberal approach based on British Whiggish traditions and made it look Indian. In 1904, he founded the Phoenix Farm in Natal, aiming to realize these ideals in common life.
Return to India[]
Gandhi on his return to India
Gandhi first united the disparate Indian community in South Africa before stepping up his campaign through a peaceful march into the Transvaal, defying the authorities until the South African government backed down in 1914. On 9 January 1915, Gandhi returned to India, and he took part in a number of specific agitations. Through his non-violent satyagraha movement, he led all these to a successful conclusion. Based on this experience, his reputation from South Africa and subsequent campaigns, and his sheer personality, he was able to convince the Indian National Congress to start a campaign of non-cooperation in 1919-1920. This was a reaction to the Rowlatt Act, the Amritsar massacre, and Muslim concerns at the abolition of the caliphate in the Ottoman Empire, with British compliance. Gandhi became the leader of the Indian National Congress and the nationalist movement after the non-cooperation policy was adopted at the Nagpur Session in 1920, and he was imprisoned from 1922 to 1924 after the campaign escalated into violence. He would occasionally withdraw from public life, but he continued to remain the one true leader of the movement, despite his formal control over the INC being consistently minimal.
Civil disobedience[]
Gandhi speaking to his followers from a microphone
In response to the establishment of the Simon Commission, he demanded dominion status for India. When this was ignored, he initiated another civil disobedience movement, choosing the symbolic issue of the Salt Law (which hit the poor particularly hard) as the focus of his campaign. He led the Salt March in 1930, which received enormous national attention and support. In 1931, he represented the INC at the second Round Table Conference in London, and he opposed its decision for separate political representation for the depressed classes as divisive to the community, opposing B.R. Ambedkar's views. In 1932, he negotiated the Poona Pact, which reserved seats for the depressed classes, while maintaining a united electorate. During the 1930s, he became increasingly concerned with the depressed classes and the untouchables, whom he called harijans ("children of God"). During World War II, he opposed Subhas Chandra Bose's attempt to use Britain's weakness for the cause of independence, despite the unpopularity of his cause among the INC rank and file. However, he launched the "Quit India" campaign in response to the British involvement of India in the war without Indian consent, and he was imprisoned from 1942 to 1944.
Last years[]
Gandhi after being shot
After the war, he was relegated to the political sidelines, with the negotiations for independence and separation being handled by Jawaharlal Nehru and Muhammad Ali Jinnah. The decline of his actual influence was partly due to his elevation to mythical status within his own lifetime, but it was also because he was his own worst enemy as a practical politician. He was more suitable to leading the nationalist movement when its main task was defiance, not while it engaged in protracted, pragmatic policies; Gandhi was always self-doubting and reluctant to compromise on his ideals. He was deeply disturbed by the Partition of India and the communal violence that accompanied it, and he engaged in a final fast in Delhi on 111 January 1948 to protest against the prosecution of Muslims in the city. Nehru's cabinet quickly established better relations with Pakistan, while the violence in Delhi ended. He broke off his fast a week later, only to be assassinated soon afterwards by Nathuram Godse, a young Hindu radical outraged by his benevolence towards Muslims. As he was greeted by crowds in the garden of the former Birla House in New Delhi, Godse fired three bullets from a Beretta pistol into Gandhi's chest at point-blank range, and he died in a bedroom of the Birla House 30 minutes later.
Gallery[]
