Kelby brick biography of mahatma gandhi
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On a train voyage to Pretoria, he was thrown out of a first-class railway compartment and beaten up by a white stagecoach driver after refusing to give up his seat for a European passenger. At the age of 19, Mohandas left home to study law in London at the Inner Temple, one of the city’s four law colleges. He particularly advocated the manufacture of khaddar, or homespun cloth, in order to replace imported textiles from Britain.
Drafted during a period of intensive fasting and "in-dwelling" at his ashram in Ahmedebad, his story of the soul portrayed the deeper, more inward experiences that made him externally an innovator in the struggles against violence, racism, and colonialism. When a European magistrate in Durban asked him to take off his turban, he refused and left the courtroom.
The book, written in Gujarati and translated into English by Mahadev Desai, would become an international classic, hailed as one of the "100 Best Spiritual Books of the 20th Century."
This first critical edition of this seminal work by leading Gandhi scholar Tridip Suhrud offers an unprecedented window into the original Gujarati text.
That train journey served as a turning point for Gandhi, and he soon began developing and teaching the concept of satyagraha (“truth and firmness”), or passive resistance, as a way of non-cooperation with authorities.
The Birth of Passive Resistance
In 1906, after the Transvaal government passed an ordinance regarding the registration of its Indian population, Gandhi led a campaign of civil disobedience that would last for the next eight years.
He soon accepted a position with an Indian firm that sent him to its office in South Africa. Drawn back into the political fray by the outbreak of World War II, Gandhi again took control of the INC, demanding a British withdrawal from India in return for Indian cooperation with the war effort. Gandhi’s eloquence and embrace of an ascetic lifestyle based on prayer, fasting and meditation earned him the reverence of his followers, who called him Mahatma (Sanskrit for “the great-souled one”).
Tridip Suhrud is professor and director, Archives, at CEPT University, Ahmedabad.
Mahatma Gandhi
Early Life
Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was born on October 2, 1869, at Porbandar, in the present-day Indian state of Gujarat. Suhrud is presently translating the diaries of Manu Gandhi, covering the period between 1942 and 1948, compiling a series 'Letters to Gandhi'-of unpublished correspondence to Gandhi-and working on an eight-volume compendium of testimonies of the indigo cultivators of Champaran.
He supported the British war effort in World War I but remained critical of colonial authorities for measures he felt were unjust. Upon returning to India in mid-1891, he set up a law practice in Bombay, but met with little success. He backed off after violence broke out–including the massacre by British-led soldiers of some 400 Indians attending a meeting at Amritsar–but only temporarily, and by 1920 he was the most visible figure in the movement for Indian independence.
Leader of a Movement
As part of his nonviolent non-cooperation campaign for home rule, Gandhi stressed the importance of economic independence for India.
Apart from a number of books on Gandhi's life, Suhrud has co-edited the critical annotated edition of Hind Swaraj, translated Narayan Desai's four-volume biography of Gandhi, My Life Is My Message, and translated the four-volume epic Gujarati novel, Sarasvatichandra. In this first-ever critical edition, eminent scholar Tridip Suhrud shines new light on Gandhi's life and thought.
An Autobiography or The Story of My Experiments with Truth: Critical Edition
Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi is among the most enigmatic, charismatic, deeply revered and equally reviled figures of the twentieth century. Meanwhile, some of his party colleagues–particularly Mohammed Ali Jinnah, a leading voice for India’s Muslim minority–grew frustrated with Gandhi’s methods, and what they saw as a lack of concrete gains.