ABOUT MOHANDAS KARAMCHAND GANDHI

( MAHATMA GANDHI )

RESEARCH QUESTION (RQ)

1) WHO IS MAHATMA GANDHI?

2) WHAT IS HIS LIFE HISTORY?

3) WHAT IS THE EDUCATION LEVEL OF HIM?

4) WHAT HIS INVOLVEMENT AND WHAT HE DID FOR INDIA?

5) WHAT IS CHAMPARAN SATYAGRAHA AND KHEDA SATYAGRAHA?

THESIS STATEMENT

Gandhi played a major role in the development of nonviolence and peace activities. Mohandas
Karamchand Gandhi was the pre-eminent political and spiritual leader of India and the Indian
independence movement. He had many followers, and taught many how to protest peacefully,
instead of using violence and war. Gandhi is a role model for many people today and is one of
the most famous of all nonviolent activists. Gandhi made a large impact on the world through his
work. There are few interesting factors about Gandhi that have been collected such his early life
history, his education, his visit to South Africa, Champaran Satyagraha and Kheda Satyagraha.

EARLY LIFE

In his early years, the stories of Shravana and Harishchandra reflecting the importance of truth
deeply influenced Gandhi. He realized that truth and love are among the supreme values through
these stories and his personal experiences. Mohandas married Kasturba Makhanji at the age of
13. Gandhi later revealed that at that age the marriage meant nothing to him and that he was only
happy and excited to wear new clothes. But then, as days went by, his feelings for her became
lusty, which he later confessed in his autobiography with regret. Gandhi had also confessed that,
because of his mind wavering towards his new and young wife, he could no longer concentrate
in school.

EDUCATION

A nine - year - old Gandhi was enrolled in a local school after his family moved to Rajkot, where
he studied the basics of arithmetic, history, geography, and languages. He attended a high school
in Rajkot at the age of 11. Because of his wedding he lost an academic year in between but later
joined the school and finally finished his schooling. After joining it in 1888, he dropped out of
Samaldas College in Bhavnagar State. A family friend Mavji Dave Joshiji later advised Gandhi
to pursue law in London. Excited by the idea, Gandhi succeeded in persuading his mother and
wife to abstain from eating meat and sex in London. With his brother's support, Gandhi left
for London to attend and practice the Inner Temple. Gandhi joined a Vegetarian Society during
his stay in London and was soon introduced by some of his vegetarian friends to Bhagavad
Gita. Bhagavad Gita's contents would later have a massive impact on his life. After being called
by Inner Temple to the bar, he returned to India.

HIS VISIT TO AFRICA

Gandhi struggled to find work as a lawyer after returning to India. In 1893, Dada Abdullah, a
merchant who owned a South African shipping business, asked if he was interested in serving in
South Africa as his cousin's lawyer. Gandhi gladly accepted the offer and left as a turning point
in his political career to South Africa. He faced racial discrimination against blacks and Indians
in South Africa. On many occasions he faced humiliation, but he decided to fight for his
rights. This made him an activist and he took on many cases that would benefit the South African
Indians and other minorities. Indians were not permitted to vote or walk on footpaths because
those privileges were strictly limited to Europeans. Gandhi questioned this unfair treatment and
eventually succeeded in establishing a Natal Indian Congress organization in 1894. After finding
an ancient Indian literature known as ' Tirukkural, ' originally written in Tamil and later
translated into many languages, Gandhi was influenced by the idea of Satyagraha (devotion to
the truth) and carried out non - violent protests around 1906. After spending 21 years in South
Africa, where he fought for civil rights, he had transformed into a new person and he returned to
India in 1915.

CHAMPARAN SATYAGRAHA

Gandhi's first major success after his arrival in India was the Champaran agitation in 1917. The
British landlords forced the area's peasants to grow Indigo, which was a cash crop, but their
demand had declined. To make matters worse, they had to sell their crops at a fixed price to the
planter. The farmers turned for help to Gandhiji. Gandhi took the administration by surprise,
pursuing a nonviolent agitation strategy, and was successful in obtaining concessions from the
authorities. This campaign marked the arrival of Gandhi in India!
KHEDA SATYAGRAHA

Farmers asked the British to relax tax payments as floods hit Kheda in 1918. Gandhi took the
farmers ' case and led the protests when the British failed to pay heed to the requests. He
instructed them not to pay any income whatsoever. The British subsequently gave in and agreed
to relax the collection of income and gave their word to Vallabhbhai Patel, who represented the
farmers.

SUMMARY

Although Gandhi received a warm welcome in England, the Conference foundered on the issue
of how an independent India would deal with its Muslim minority, and Gandhi withdrew from
public life again. But independence could not be long delayed. The Government of India Act
(1935) surrendered significant amounts of power to Indians, and the Indian National Congress
clamored for more. When World War II broke out, India erupted into violence, and many
nationalist leaders, including Gandhi, went to prison. After the war, the new British government
wanted to get India off its hands quickly. But Muhammed Ali Jinnah, the head of the Muslim
League, demanded that a separate state be created for India's Muslims, and to Gandhi's great
distress, the Congress leaders and the harried British agreed. August of 1947 saw India's
attainment of independence–as well as its partition into two countries, India and Pakistan.
However, neither measure served to solve India’s problems, nor the country immediately fell
apart: Hindus and Muslims killed each other in alarming numbers while refugees fled toward the
borders. Heartbroken, Gandhi tried to calm the country, but to no avail. He was assassinated by a
Hindu nationalist in Delhi on January 30, 1948, and India mourned the loss of its greatest hero.
REFERENCES

https://www.culturalindia.net/indian-history/modern-history/mahatma-gandhi.html

https://www.history.com/topics/india/mahatma-gandhi

https://www.fcps.net/site/handlers/filedownload.ashx?moduleinstanceid=19718&dataid=18252&
FileName=gandhi.pdf