In the 18th century, the British took control of India, and its population. From this point on, the Indians endured the hardships that come with being a British colony. India remained under British rule, until Mohandas Gandhi came along. Some call him “Father of the Indian Nation”, others call him “Mahatma” meaning “great soul”, but regardless of titles, Gandhi was truly a great man, and an example of the pure love and peace we can find in every soul. Gandhi was not only a politician, but a revolutionary leader, and without his efforts, and use of satyagraha, India would not have gained the independence that it still has to this day.
Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was born on October 2, 1869 in Porbandar, India. Although Gandhi lived frugally in
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He resorted to civil disobedience, “the active, professed refusal to obey certain laws, demands, and commands of a government, or of an occupying international power” (Wikipedia). Civil disobedience has been used in many different societies by many different leaders to free themselves and their people from oppression. In India, civil disobedience focused on a policy called “satyagraha” (Satyagraha, Britannica). Satya means truth, and “agraha” means insistence, together they mean “insistence on truth”. Satyagraha was seen as passive resistance and a sign of weakness by many, however Gandhi made it clear that Satyagraha was far from a passive approach to protesting. Satyagraha perceived nonviolence as a more powerful entity than violence. The largest aspect of Satyagraha was patient suffering. In patient suffering, the sufferers endure the abuse of their oppressors until the oppressors can no longer incur the abuse. The ability to be violent would eventually deplete, while the ability of the protestors to endure the violence would not ever subside. The strength needed to actively resist violence and oppression peacefully, was not in any way passive. Ghandi once said, “‘Satyagraha is the weapon of the strong, it admits of no violence under any circumstances whatsoever, and it ever insists upon truth. I think I have made the distinction perfectly clear [between satyagraha and passive resistance]’”(Gandhiji and
Mohandas Gandhi was a non-violent promoter for Indian independence.He was married young at 13,and went to London to go to law school.Gandhi got his degree there and was on his way to being a lawyer.He went to his first case,but couldn't even speak. Gandhi then got invited to South Africa from a businessman. Gandhi’s luck their was no good either.European racism came to him,after he got kicked off of a train,because he was “colored” and was holding a first class ticket.When Gandhi fought back because of it,was arrested and was sent to jail.After this, he became know as as a leader.Gandhi returned to India in 1896,and he was disgusted by it.British wanted them to wear their clothes,copy their manners,accept their standards of beauty,but Gandhi refused.Gandhi wanted people to live free of all class and wealth.Gandhi tried so hard and was more successful then any other man in India.They won independence in 1947. Gandhi’s non-violent movement worked because,Gandhi used clever planning, mass appeal, conviction, and compassion to win independence for India.
The mission of Gandhi’s life was to help the people of India free themselves from British rule. Many people have struggled for independence. They have fought bloody battles or used terrorism in an attempt to achieve their goals. Gandhi’s revolution was different. He succeeded as an independence leader with the use of nonviolent methods. The young Mohandas Gandhi did not seem as a boy that would become a great leader. He changed as he studied in Britain and practiced in South Africa. He fought for the rights of Indians in both South Africa and India. Gandhi believed that all people in the world are brothers and sisters. He didn’t hate the English. Actually, he saw a lot that was good about them. His nonviolent means of revolution was referred to as satyagraha, which is a combination of two Sanskrit words, satya, meaning truth and love, plus agraha, meaning firmness. Many people were influenced by satyagraha.
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...
From the onset of man fighting for freedom or his beliefs, the question has always been whether one person can make a difference using words rather than wars. Philosophically, the concept of civil disobedience would appear to be an ineffective weapon against political injustice; history however has proven it to repeatedly be one of the most powerful weapons of the common man. Martin Luther King Jr. looked at the way African Americans were treated in the United States and saw an inequality. By refusing to pay his taxes and subsequently being imprisoned for a night, Henry David Thoreau demonstrated his intolerance for the American government. Under British rule, India remained oppressed until Mohandas Gandhi, with his doctrine of non-violence lead the country to freedom.
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.
Mohandas Gandhi is an Indian lawyer and a spiritual leader that led a successful nonviolent resistance movement against the British colonial power. “The tactic of nonviolence civil disobedience in the Civil Rights Movement was deeply influenced by the model of Mohandas Gandhi, (...) Gandhi 's approach of non-violent civil disobedience involved provoking authorities by breaking the law peacefully, to force those in power to acknowledge existing injustice and bring it to an end”. (1) “Provoking authorities by breaking the law peacefully” this is an example of how nonviolent disobedience allows the message to stay focused and reach the point where people in power cannot ignore. Violent actions draw the media away from the message and fuels the rich and powerful; those who hide behind barriers in order to mute the underprivileged. An example of underprivileged people is African American’s during the 1950s who were treated like second class citizens. “Laws separated people of color from whites in schools, housing, jobs, and public gathering places”. (3) The types of methods used to fight against segregation are, “One of the ways African American communities fought legal segregation was through direct action protests, such as boycotts, sit-ins, and mass civil disobedience”. (1) This is how nonviolent disobedience is fought
Gandhi believed “Non-violence is the greatest force man has been endowed with. Truth is the only goal he has. For God is none other but truth. But Truth cannot be, never will be, reached except through non-violence.”(‘Non-Violence- The Greatest Gift). One of Gandhi’s best-known non-violent protest was the Salt Satyagrah, that took place from 1930-1931, a 241 mile march to the coast to protest British rule and the salt taxes. Gandhi used techniques such as formal statements, prayer, boycotts, and honoring of the men and women killed or wounded by the British especially for those who were killed at Amritsar in 1919. Indian gained its independence from Britain on August 15, 1947 and Gandhi was assassinated in 1948 by a Hindu extremist who did not share the same beliefs as Gandhi ("Gandhi begins fast in protest of caste
...was experiencing. Lastly, Gandhi continued to struggle with the satyagraha belief and was willing to devote his time on demanding the British to “quit India.” However, despite being imprisoned for this campaign, Gandhi aroused upheaval from the Indians who insisted the British to remove Gandhi from captivity. After the execution of the Salt March, the events that followed supported Gandhi’s philosophy on the satyagraha movement and further more brought India closer to its Independence from the British colonization.
Gandhi’s speech on the eve of his historic march on March 11, 1930, was intended as his last speech to his followers. He highlighted what his followers should do in the event that he was arrested for his crimes. They were to continue to try to attain Swaraj (self-governance, i.e. the country rules itself) with non-violence and truth. Instead of violence, he wanted them to cause civil disobedience by breaking small laws, such as owning and selling illegal salts, as well as purchasing or making them. He wanted the employees of the Government (British rule in India) to stop working in protest, in an attempt to undermine it. Gandhi asked for the taxpayers, and all who were cooperating with the Government to stop cooperating, doing things such as not sending their children to public schools or keeping titles. He also asked for them to have self-confidence in the goal of Swaraj, and to become leaders, while stressing non-violence and truth. Gandhi also asked his followers to continue to follow local leaders; to ensure that leadership at all levels in India was not changed all at once. At the end of his speech Gandhi tells his followers that is they are always truthful and non-violent while trying to make India self-governing, they will always be victorious, even if
...Because of Gandhi’s power, his flaw, and his catastrophe, one would say that Gandhi fits the model of a Greek tragic hero. Gandhi’s power was his heightened goodness, proven by his innumerable civil disobedience acts, where he continued to fight even while he was regularly jailed. His flaw was his tolerance and acceptance of everyone which led to his catastrophic assassination by Nathuram Godse. Gandhi’s teachings of nonviolence and peace still live on today, as they have inspired many other human rights leaders, such as Martin Luther King Jr. and Nelson Mandela. Gandhi’s teachings are responsible for the successes of civil rights movements in other countries. He not only helped free India from British rule, but also gave people new thoughts about violence and imperialism around the world. Even today, India continues to live and remember the tutelage of Gandhi.
In 1914 he returned as a hero to all Indian people and was considered a holly man, because of this he was often referred to as Mahatma which means great soul. Wile in India the British started to take Indian civil liberties after world war one, hence Gandhi protested fallowing his own nonviolent ways when the Amritsar massacre occurred and both he and India came to the realization that India needed to be a self governed people.
“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.
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.
It was between 1915 and his assassination in 1945 that he struggled for India's freedom. Gandhi's teachings of non-violent resistance, known as satyagraha, has had a lasting effect and influence on the world today. He has been the role model for many famous, influential people such as American civil rights activist Martin Luther King Jr. and former South African President Nelson Mandela. His continued influence can still be felt today in many non-violent peace organizations around the world bearing his name or teaching his philosophy.
(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”)