Long before the Salt Satyagraha was launched by Mahatma Gandhi from Sabarmati Ashram in Ahmedabad on 12 March 1930, there were popular uprisings, hunger-strikes in jails, workers' strikes and public processions denouncing the ruthless colonial rule subjugating the country.
Apath of non-violent struggle can often be the best forward when the cause is deeply rooted in justice and there is widespread recognition of this being so.
On the death anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi, Trinamul Congress national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee took a pledge to carry on with the struggle to protect rights of the deprived.
Even Mahatma Gandhi, who had his own tryst with apartheid in South Africa and who sympathized with the Jews owing to the unprecedented pain and persecution they faced at the hands of Nazis, was able to nuance his views on the Israel-Palestine issue with the comment, Palestine belongs to the Arabs in the same sense that England belongs to the English, and France to the French
To the British, a non-violent Pathan was unthinkable, a fraud that masked something cunning and darkly treacherous. In the most horrifying case, the British killed about 400 Khudai Khidmatgar members in Peshawar on 23 April 1930. The massacre at the Qissa Khawani Bazaar became a defining moment in the non-violent struggle to drive the British out of India
In his autobiography, Gandhiji talked of his visit to Calcutta as it then was in 1896, and the contrasting receptions he got from editors of the different newspapers he met to talk about his work in South Africa. One editor thought he was a wandering Jew while another after keeping him waiting for an hour told him, “You had better go. I am not disposed to listen to you.” Gandhiji writes: “…I met the Anglo-Indian editors also. The Statesman and The Englishman realised the importance of the (South African) question. I gave them long interviews and they published them in full.” We publish these interviews here, among the first of Gandhiji published in India.
Surprisingly, it is easy to believe in the miracles of sainthood, but very hard to believe in those of flesh and blood; the prodigies of leadership who transform the world and the way we see and move and act in the world. Yet, as Gandhi himself taught, these are not miracles at all. He summed up the philosophy of his own epic life in five words: ‘My life is my message‘
Even in a world torn by many violent conflicts, statistics year after year show that the toll of everyday violence is even higher
First, let us take a brief look at how nation-states advanced after obtaining freedom from the yoke of colonialism
During his return voyage to South Africa on board S.S. Kildonan Castle, Gandhi wrote his famous book entitled Hind Swaraj or Indian Home Rule ~ having about 30,000 words in Gujarati ~ on the steamer’s stationery within 10 days, in all 270 pages. He wrote at a feverish pitch, the pen racing across the page so quickly that the right hand grew tired, and about fifty pages were written with the left hand.
