Dandi March:
The Britishers had arrived as East India Company traders in India at the start of the seventeenth century. By the end of the seventeenth century, strategically, they had very firmly rooted themselves on the Indian soil, and started ruling the people of India. It was only in the 1857 that the First Mutiny happened when the Indians started rebelling towards the British Rule. This act was followed by many more ; of which most influential was the concept of nonviolent movement initiated by Mahatma Gandhi. His key approach to standing up against the British Rule was not through arms or ammunitions, but through nonviolence. The Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore bestowed the title of “Mahatma” meaning “great soul”on Gandhi in 1915 while
These sources are reflected in his words to his followers like, “ let there be not a semblance of breach of peace even after all of us have been arrested. We have resolved to utilize all our resources in the pursuit of an exclusively nonviolent struggle. Let no one commit a wrong in anger. This is my hope and prayer. I wish these words of mine reached every nook and corner of the land.” Then there is, “ No one who believes in nonviolence, as a creed, need, therefore sit still....wherever possible, civil disobedience of salt should be started.” Towards the end of the speech there is an open mention by Gandhi that all what he has said and explained in his speech may be taken as his will , and that there ought not to be any suspension or postponement of plans in case he is arrested.
On studying the aftermath of the Salt March from various reliable sources, we know that the news spread like a wildfire all over India. The impact of the Salt March was considerably significant. According to The Gandhi Reader: A Sourcebook of His Life and Writings, 1994 , “Dandi salt march break out into mass civil disobedience movement, many Indians broke the law by making or illegally trading the salt....The salt march also inspired, Ghaffar Khan led non-violent movement against the British
The speech reflects an immense clarity of his thought and purpose. Gandhi employs use of simple and direct words in the execution of the process of Swaraj. There seems to be a method and transparency to delivering his intentions and plan to the INC leaders as well as masses. Readers, as also mentioned before, can see that his authority is evident throughout his speech. They can feel the depth of purpose or seriousness of the matter in Gandhi’s speech. He claims, in many places in his speech, of going to jail or even considers the prospect of these being his last words of his life; reflecting that he has a do or die kind of attitude for this purpose. Readers get the feel of the strong core values, which also seem to be the spine of Gandhi’s means for attaining Swaraj. He does not want to compromise with them, as is evident throughout his speech. He, time and again, emphasizes on the importance of adherence to truth, nonviolence and peace; even upon his arrest or death, which gives the reader an impression that Gandhi holds these values very dearly to his heart. He employs words like “this is my hope and prayer”, “pledge”, and “ take it is as my will” to convey his views to the masses regarding the importance of these values; generating also much pathos. Gandhi seems to be clear about what kind of people should or should not participate in this movement. He
He showed how he believed that in order to not support evil, one must not succumb to violence. Gandhi closed by giving the judge and the assessors [of the court] two choices: to resign their jobs and therefore separate themselves from what Gandhi called evil (most likely the British Empire). They would only do this, he said, if they strongly disagree with the laws that Gandhi was accused of, or if they believed Gandhi to be innocent. The other choice was to punish Gandhi according to the law, showing that they agree with the laws and believe that are beneficial to the
How did India earn its independence from Great Britain? War? Riots? Killing? Mohandas Gandhi used his peaceful nonviolent strategy to gain independence from England. Nonviolence is a calm and peaceful method that does not include hurting or harm to anything or anybody. What nonviolent tactics did Gandhi use? Gandhi, who was born in 1869, was a brilliant man that put India back on its feet. Many wonder why and how his nonviolent methods succeeded. The three elements that Gandhi used to make his nonviolent strategies successful are accepting his jail time, embracing the enemy, and he used disciplined civil disobedience.
The introduction of civil disobedience reminded the world that it had the option of nonviolence and that negative action did not have to be countered with equally negative reaction. Henry David Thoreau’s essay “Civil Disobedience” embraced the idea of a man who took action to maintain his morality, even if it meant defying the government. Mahatma Gandhi, in turn, instigated his own act of civil disobedience in the Salt March where he marched across India and collected salt forbidden by British law. Thoreau’s writings on civil disobedience inspired Gandhi’s nonviolent movement, the Salt March, in which he was compelled to take action against a corrupt government.
These marches led by Gandhi showed the British how determined the Indians were about taking back their own rights. No matter how violent the British reacted, the Indians remained peaceful. “Suddenly, at a word of command, scores of native police rushed upon the advancing marchers and rained blows on their heads with their steel shod lathis. Not one of the marchers even raised an arm to fend off the
In the article “Mahatma Gandhi” on Biography.com the text states, “Revered the world over for his nonviolent philosophy of passive resistance, Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was known to his many followers as Mahatma, or “the great-souled one” As you can see Gandhi was worshipped worldwide for his peaceful and persistent ways of protesting, which proves his dedication to the cause of human rights. Another section of the text in the article “Mahatma Gandhi” shows, “… Gandhi led a campaign of civil disobedience that would last for the next eight years. During its final phase in 1913, hundreds of Indians living in South Africa, including women, went to jail, and thousands of striking Indian miners were imprisoned, flogged and even shot.” This once again shows Gandhi’s dedication to human rights for he led an eight year campaign for the freedom of human rights. Lastly, the article “Mahatma Gandhi” claims, “The Salt March sparked similar protests, and mass civil disobedience swept across India. Approximately 60,000 Indians were jailed for breaking the Salt Acts, including Gandhi, who was imprisoned in May 1930.” This shows Gandhi's Patience for his cause, because of the fact that he was willing to peacefully wait out his jail time until he was
One of the laws prohibited Indians from making their own salt. Salt was essential in the Indian culture and the British forced them to buy salt and had a tax on salt. A large population of India was impoverished and struggled due to the expense of salt and the additional tax. Gandhi led the salt march, an act to defy the British laws on salt. Thousands of people joined Gandhi on his march and they gathered at the seaside to make sea salt. Symbolically, they reach the sea on the anniversary of the Massacre of Amritsar. The protest, once again aggravated the British. The police arrived and demanded that they hand over the salt. After refusing to give the salt to the police, many Indians were arrested. It was an issue for the British primarily because of money. They made it illegal for the Indians to make their own salt because the needed the profit they got from selling and taxing salt. The Indian people suffered from poverty from many of the British laws, and the salt laws were increasingly frustrating for them. A group of non-violent protesters arrived at the Dharasana Salt Works and were beaten. Although every man before them had been brutally knocked down, the peaceful protesters continued to walk up to the British. The act showed the British the determination of the Indian people. No many how many times they were beaten or arrested, there would still be people protesting. Soon after the protest at Dharasana Salt Works, Gandhi and others were released from jail. A conference was held in Britain to discuss the possibility of India’s independence. The Indian people were successful in their fight against British
Civil Disobedience: Martin Luther King Jr, Gandhi, and the Legacy of Peace They Left Behind
Gandhi’s nonviolent movement worked because he didn’t believe in segregation and didn’t follow the British’s rules for Indians. When coming back from prison in 1859, things changed in India. The people if India were forced to mimic the English on how they dressed, copy their manner and accept their standards of beauty. When hearing this, Gandhi didn’t accept it and started his movement. According to the background document,” he shed the cloths that made him look like a British lawyer and dressed in a poor man’s traditional loincloth.”(Background document) By do...
Gandhi’s implementation for the Salt March was the result of British colonization of India, which had caused a change in the lifestyle of the Indians. In 1975 when the East India Company established manufacturing monopolies, which assisted the British to exercise their powers over the salt facilities in India by applying salt taxes. As the British occupied the salt works, the Indian population became deprived of one of the most important resources. Thus, the Indians in nation began to fall apart, because the strict British ruling restricted the Indians to perform against the salt taxes. The Salt March was a way that Gandhi sought to inspire a strong uniformity in the minds of the many. These Indians soon adapted to Gandhi’s nonviolent belief and became known as the satyagrahis, w...
People in India call him Mahatma and according to the oxford dictionary it means a revered person regarded with love and respect, two words that Gandhi uses a lot in his writing, in this essay he used the word love eight times. He is recognized as “The Father of the Nation” in India. The essay “My Faith in Nonviolence” was written in 1930 and was directed to the Indian people. Also in 1930 Gandhi started a march to the sea to protest the British rule of India so this letter and many others were important for Gandhi to explain his message to his followers. Gandhi supported his claim
He believes that the knowledge of swaraj and satyagraha are inseparable. He saw swaraj as the end and satyagraha as the means. He compared the end to a tree and the means to a seed. If we want a tree, we must put the seed in the earth first. This is also true for the independence of India in which “true liberation comes only through the purest of means, the power of nonviolence.” (Dalton 15) Missions of Gandhi after he came back from South Africa were to make people believe that love was the strongest weapon in the world. He advocated that Hindus should love Muslims, Indians should love British, and even the oppressed should love the oppressors. He was put into prisons for several times by the British government for unjustified charges, but he did not fight against the laws and the government by violence. He was an example of practicing love and non-violence. Although Indians paid for the means of nonviolence in Chauri Chaura and riots between Hindus and Muslims, the application of nonviolence were successful in noncooperation campaign, resisting salt tax movement, independence of India, and stopping riots between Hindus and Muslims. These successes had proved that satyagraha is efficacious for
Gandhi is motivated by religious means; he believes that everyone is equal in God’s eyes. He gets involved in several movements for equality, and he stresses non-violence very strongly. The Indians are very mad because British rule continues to limit their rights. They are supposed to all get fingerprinted, and their marriage laws are invalid. Gandhi’s followers vow to fight their oppressors to the death, but he discourages them from violence.
Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi- 2 October 1869 - 30 January 194 was the pre-eminent political and spiritual leader of India during the Indian independence movement. He is also known as Mahatma which means “The Great Soul”. He was committed to pacifism, that there should be no violence.(1) He had three concepts to follow in his life for independence of India: Satyagraha, Ahimsa and Swaraj.
(Bio.com.) As a result, the British imprisoned more than 60,000 people. A year later, Gandhi accepted a truce and called off the civil disobedience movement. (“Gandhi, Mahatma”)
“The strongest physical force bends before moral force when used in the defense of truth.” - Mahatma Gandhi (Bondurant). Mahatma Gandhi was the main leader in helping India become independent through the principles of non violence, self-rule, and the unity of Hindus and Muslims. His full name was Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, but he was given the name Mahatma later on in his life. He wanted to see an united India without the rule of the British Empire. He accomplished this with passive resistance or resistance by non violence because he wanted to show that violence is not always the best answer.