October 02 is called Gandhi Jayanti; it is the celebration of the birth of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi or Mahatma Gandhi, the Father of the Nation. Gandhi Jayanti is celebrated globally as the International Day of Non-Violence. It raises the question of how relevant Gandhian ideas are in a world beset by wars, authoritarianism, religious intolerance, pollution, climate change, and
racism, all issues that plague our times. His ideas are based on his vision of a just and equitable society.
NON-VIOLENCE. Many would consider the Gandhian ideas of non-violence or Ahimsa as redundant in a world armed to the teeth with chemical, biological, nuclear, and conventional weapons. Ahimsa, first propounded by Mahavira, was a method employed by Gandhi to achieve political and social change. Gandhi believed in peaceful means to change unjust laws. To be non-violent in a violent world takes far more strength and courage. Non-violent movements are viewed favorably by the international community, particularly countries that
uphold human rights and international law. Non-violent resistance can de-escalate the level of violence, even if it can't eliminate it. Protests, boycotts, and strikes are a less lethal way of fighting back. In a war, today, it is the non-combatants - the women, children, and the elderly who suffer the most.
A movement in Palestine can galvanize international bodies and civil society to advocate strongly for Palestinian rights and Palestinian statehood.
It's assumed that non-violence is a weapon of the weak. In reality, using non-violence as a means to achieve a goal needs a level of courage that is far greater. Gandhi coupled Ahimsa with Satyagraha to achieve his goals.
SATYAGRAHA. In Sanskrit, Satya means truth, and Agraha means insistence; the literal translation is using truth to insist on achieving a goal. Salt, a common dietary article, was taxed heavily by British colonial rulers, and as far back as 1891, Gandhi wrote asking that it be abolished. He drew attention to it again in 1909, asking that it be repealed. Once again in 1930,
Gandhi wrote to the Viceroy. Lord Irwin, the salt tax should be abolished. This, too, was ignored. Gandhi decided that he would use Satyagraha to protest against this unjust tax. The Dandi March began from Sabarmati Ashram on 12 March 1930 to Dandi on the Arabian Sea coast. There were 78 followers when the march began, and thousands joined him en route. He reached Dandi on 05 April 1930. The press was in full attendance, and pictures of the march were transmitted worldwide. The next day, after his morning prayers, Gandhi waded into the seashore and collected a handful of salt. This was an act of defiance, and the police arrived and arrested him. The police brutally beat the protesters, who offered no resistance and bore the beatings with stoical fortitude. The salt laws were broken by other Satyagrahi protestors in other
parts of coastal India, and they were peaceful despite the beatings sustained.
This act of Satyagraha drew the world’s attention to the brutal British colonial rule and an unjust tax. It forced them to invite Gandhi to England to participate in the Second Round Table Conference. The Dandi March, on a personal note, reinforced Gandhi’s philosophy of countering force with the truth. As such, it was a failure for the Salt Law was only repealed in 1947 when Jawaharlal Nehru was the Prime Minister of an interim government, and Liaqat Ali Khan was his finance minister. The Goods and Services Tax of 2017 has no levy on salt.
Gandhi had said,’ I have nothing new to teach the world. Truth and non-violence are as old as the hills. All I have done is to try to experiment with both on a scale as vast as I could.’
SARVODAYA. This was a word coined by Gandhi. Sarv means all, and Uday means rising. What Gandhi meant by SARVODAYA was the welfare of all. The concept is truly noble, but the reality is that it is impossible to implement as Gandhi conceptualised it. His idea was a village-based economy, with moral, spiritual overtures riding a socialist chassis. The rich were “trustees” rather than owners of their assets, and were to use their wealth to benefit the community. Every individual in society, especially the marginalized. and the poor had to be uplifted. He called this “Antodaya”. He proposed a voluntary method based on love, compassion, and cooperation. Violence was eschewed. There was no role for conflict or for exploitation. The transformation of society was to lead to several villages, which would be known as Gram Swaraj. Capitalism, the exploitation of peasants and workers, was completely rejected. Fruits of labour were to be shared equally.
The concept of Sarvodaya is rich morally and spiritually, but fares poorly in reality. Today's India aspires to be a trillion-dollar economy and attract investments from abroad; it teems with youth armed with college degrees in search of a better existence. A huge population exists with aspirations for a better quality of life. People have flooded towns, live in slums and shanties, and have put creaky urban infrastructure in imminent danger of a complete collapse. A complete overhaul of Gandhi’s concept of Sarvodaya is needed. Our political scientists, planners, academicians, and interested parties can rework Sarvodaya into a modern framework to reduce the load on our urban centres. This is possible if villages become economic powerhouses.
SWADESHI. To Gandhi, Swadeshi meant self-reliance as the key principle of stopping poverty and the uplift of the poor. When he returned to India from South Africa in 1915, widespread poverty, unemployment, and the devastation brought about by imports at the expense of Indian industry appalled him and led to the idea of Swadeshi. This involved the rejection of British imperial exploitation of India. Indian raw material was exported to Britain in British ships, processed in factories in that country, and sent to India to be
sold to Indians. Two products were particularly galling - salt that came from Liverpool and cloth that came from Manchester. Swadeshi began as a political tool. In 1920, during the Non-Cooperation Movement, he launched a direct challenge to British industry. He advised Indians to boycott British goods and
textiles in particular in favour of Indian products. He urged Indians to wear khadi, and he employed the charkha to spin khadi yarn. The larger objective behind Swadeshi was to make the village the pivot of Indian industrial revival. He visualised spinning and weaving of clothes, agricultural produce by the village, handicrafts, leading to a self-sufficient rural economy. This
would resolve unemployment as well as empower the rural population.
Gandhi’s vision of village-based industry was against large-scale industrialisation. He felt that this model was exploitive, and the profits generated were at the expense of human suffering and environmental degradation. Gandhi favoured a decentralised economy wherein each village
was a self-sufficient unit. He called this concept Gram Swaraj.
Gandhi’s view of Swadeshi was humanitarian enough to see the eradication of untouchability, female emancipation and empowerment, and uplift of the marginalised as economic prosperity changed their lives. With post-independent India’s push towards centralised planning and massive industrialisation,
the Gandhian ideal of Swadeshi as he visualised it was jettisoned. Migration of rural Indians to cities in search of a better life has converted our cities into urban nightmares. With this has come inequality, immoderate consumption by a few, and in this digital age, it is splashed all over the media.
HUMANISM. Does Gandhi have any meaning in today’s materialistic, agnostic, racist, and consumerist world? Gandhi summed it up in a sentence, ‘The earth has enough for everyone’s need but not enough for one man’s greed.’ Gandhi, above all, was a human being who rejected racism, advocated respect for human rights, respected the natural world, and stood for what was morally right. He worshipped a god through service to mankind. To him, all human beings
were the first manifestation of God.
Today, no nation strictly follows Gandhian principles in toto. This is despite his influence on non-violence, social justice, environmental protection, and civil rights. Rather, there exists a selective application of thought.
Perhaps the world would be a better place if this were not the case.
Comments
Post a Comment