On January 30 many Indians around the world stopped to remember a man who showed the world that peaceful means could resist oppression and violence.
Known to many as Ghandi, (or in India as Bupa, or Mahatma), the story of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi and his philosophy of non-violence has inspired others. Dr Martin Luther King Jr, Nelson Mandela, Steven Biko and Aung Sun Suu Khi, were inspired or directly influenced by Ghandi.
Born into a family of merchants in 1869, Ghandi became a lawyer despite his own disinterest in the idea. Trained to be a barrister in London, his time in the British capital would familiarise him with English customs and develop his understanding of the world. Such skills, he found would become useful when he took up a position in the South African province of Natal.
The Birth of Non-Violence
During his 20 years in South Africa, Ghandi encountered severe discrimination; he was thrown from trains for refusing to remove himself from a first-class cabin to which he held a valid ticket, beaten by stage coach drivers for not giving up his seat to white passengers, and he was refused entry to hotels due to his racial identity. These experiences hardened his resolve and pushed him to pursue equal rights for South Africa's Indian population. It was also in South Africa that Ghandi decided he would forgo material pursuit and instead focus on self-improvement.
Ghandi's subsequent depth of spirituality would mean his certain brand of resistance would be unique and become known as the concept of Satyagraha .
Literally Satyagraha means Satya (Truth) with Agraha (Firmness) which would be the basis of his philosophy of peaceful resistance.
The South African Government found itself unable to cope with Satyagraha . Thousands of Indians willingly got arrested and beaten and continually refused to obey racially discriminatory laws. Eventually the applied pressure forced the South African Government to negotiate with Ghandi and by 1914 had agreed to many of his demands. The British Empire received notice that Ghandi was a political activist unparalleled.
Shaking the British Empire
Upon his return to India the following year, Ghandi established an ashram (a spiritual retreat) that was dedicated to the pursuit of truth. However he again became a champion of the people and would lead protests and strikes against unjust British landlords. Soon he became a dominant figure in Indian politics. In campaign after campaign he led Indians towards self-determination and via his strict adherence to his principles of non-violence and non-cooperation Ghandi would wear down the British Indian Government. India became independent in 1947. It is said on the day that the British handed over power, Gandhi did not celebrate but was mourning the partition of the country between the Muslims and Hindus while also trying to halt violence between the two groups.
A year later, at the age of 78, he was assassinated by a fellow Hindu.
Gandhi's peaceful means of dissent became respected around the globe. In today's world with its war on terror, bombing in Iraq, the turmoil this week in Lebanon, one may wonder what a man like Mahatma Ghandi would make of an increasingly confrontational world. Would he be shocked by the level of violence that now appears acceptable? As the modern world's father of peaceful resistance, we can perhaps presume he would advocate a cessation to all military "solutions" to political problems. One thing is for certain he would inspire and motivate the oppressed and downtrodden to take a stand, peacefully.
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