Facts about Gandhi

Vinayak Damodar Savarkar condemned Gandhi for appeasing Muslims politically; Savarkar and his allies blamed Gandhi for facilitating the creation of Pakistan and increasing the Muslim political influence.

Gandhi feared that instability and insecurity in Pakistan would increase their anger against India, and violence would spread across the borders.

Fearing that the movement would become violent, and convinced that his ideas were misunderstood, Gandhi called off the campaign of mass civil disobedience.

Gandhi first discovered the “beauty of self-help” in South Africa when, out of economic interest, he began to wash and starch his own shirt collars, and to cut his own hair.

On January 30, 1948, on his way to a prayer meeting, Gandhi was shot dead in Birla House, New Delhi, by Nathuram Godse.

Gandhi opposed the British policies in South Africa, but supported the government during the Boer War in 1899.

Gandhi clarified that this time the movement would not be stopped if individual acts of violence were committed, saying that the "ordered anarchy" around him was "worse than real anarchy."

Last, but not least, the city of Pietermaritzburg, South Africa, where Gandhi was ejected in 1893 from a first-class train, now has a statue of Gandhi.

Once in Dandi, Gandhi encouraged everyone to make and trade salt.

B. R. Ambedkar, the Dalit political leader condemned Gandhi's term “Harijans” for the untouchable community as condescending.

Ambedkar and his allies complained that Gandhi undermined Dalit political rights.

At the age of 13 (May 1883), by his parents’ arrangement, Gandhi married Kasturba Makhanji (also spelled "Kasturbai" or known as "Ba"), who was the same age as he.

Gandhi’s wife found this very demeaning, although she complied.

Gandhi stayed and thus began the “History of Satyagraha” in South Africa.

A devastated Gandhi finally gave his assent, and the partition plan was approved by the Congress leadership as the only way to prevent a wide-scale Hindu-Muslim civil war.

Gandhi objected, and embarked on a fast to death to procure a more equitable arrangement for the Harijans.

English boiled vegetables were distasteful to Gandhi, so he often went without eating, as he was too polite to ask for other food.

Other films have been made about Gandhi, including The Making of the Mahatma (directed by Shyam Benegal and starring Rajat Kapur), Sardar (starring Anu Kapoor), and Hey Ram (made by Kamal Hasan).

At the end of the war, the future of Palestine was a problem.

Recognizing his influence on the Indian people, the government, represented by Lord Irwin, decided to negotiate with Gandhi.

Hindu political extremists like Pravin Togadia and Narendra Modi sometimes criticize Gandhi's leadership and actions.

Six weeks after his wife’s death, Gandhi suffered a severe malaria attack.

After six months of limited success in Bombay (Mumbai) establishing a law practice, Gandhi returned to Rajkot to earn a modest living drafting petitions for litigants.

The Gandhi-Irwin Pact, signed on March 1931, suspended the civil disobedience movement in return for freeing all political prisoners, including those from the salt march, and allowing salt production for personal use.

On January 26, 1930, millions of Indians pledged complete independence at Gandhi’s request.

Gandhi’s associate, Sardar Vallabhai Patel, represented the farmers in negotiations with the British in Kheda, where revenue collection was suspended and prisoners were released.

Gandhi was born into a Hindu Modh family of the vaishya, or business, caste in Porbandar, Gujarat, India in 1869.

To what extent Gandhi's non-violent tactics and vision was a cause, an encouragement, or hardly relevant to Britain's actions is a continuing debate among historians and politicians.

Gandhi’s solution was to establish an ashram (religious community) near Kheda, where scores of supporters and volunteers from the region did a detailed study of the villages—itemizing atrocities, suffering and degenerate living conditions.

Gandhi was willing to sacrifice his life on many occasions, pledging to fast until death, giving him a spiritual power not often seen.

During his time in prison, Gandhi's health had deteriorated, however, and he suffered two terrible blows in his personal life.

At the age of 18 on September 4, 1888, Gandhi set sail for London to train as a barrister at the University College, London.

Gandhi criticized both the British and the Indians.

Godse was a Hindu radical with links to the extremist Hindu Mahasabha, who held Gandhi responsible for weakening India by insisting upon a payment to Pakistan.

Gandhi used Satyagraha on a national level in 1919, the year the Rowlatt Act was passed, allowing the government to imprison persons accused of sedition without trial.

Gandhi and his family returned to India in 1915, where he was called the “Great Soul (“Mahatma”) in beggar’s garb” by Rabindranath Tagore, the Bengali poet and public intellectual.

Gandhi thus broke his fast by sipping orange juice.

When World War II broke out in 1939, Gandhi was initially in favor of "non-violent moral support" for the British.

Gandhi called partition “a spiritual tragedy.” On the day of the transfer of power (August 15, 1947), Gandhi mourned alone in Calcutta, where he had been working to end the city’s communal violence.

Gandhi was vehemently opposed to any plan that divided India into two separate countries.

After emotional debates with his life-long colleagues, Gandhi refused to budge, and the government rescinded its policy and made the payment to Pakistan.

Gandhi argued that support for the British legitimized Indian demands for citizenship rights as members of the British Empire.

Gandhi founded the Natal Indian Congress in 1894, with himself as the secretary and used this organization to mold the Indian community of South Africa into a heterogeneous political force.

Gandhi continued his studies after marriage, but was a mediocre student at Porbandar and later Rajkot.

At the same time, these incidents led Gandhi to focus on complete self-government and complete control of all government institutions.

Gandhi resigned as leader and member from the Congress party in 1934, convinced that it had adopted his ideas of non-violence as a political strategy rather than a as a fundamental life principle.

Gandhi attempted to bridge these differences through many means, including a 21-day fast for Hindu-Muslim unity in the autumn of 1924, but with limited success.

In 1896, Gandhi returned briefly to India to bring his wife and children to live with him in South Africa.

Rajmohan Gandhi, son of Devdas, has served in the India Congress, has written widely on human rights and conflict resolution and has received several honorary degrees from universities around the world.

Any evaluation of Gandhi's legacy should take cognizance of the fact that he was effectively a private citizen, since his leadership of the Indian National Congress did not constitute a public office as such.

Gandhi marched 400 kilometers (248 miles) from Ahmedabad to Dandi, Gujarat to make his own salt near the sea.

Muhammad Ali Jinnah and contemporary Pakistanis often condemn Gandhi for undermining Muslim political rights.

The many years of socialist government under Mrs. Gandhi contributed to a shift from western to more simple, if not Indian values and dress.

Gandhi’s platform included a swadeshi policy—the boycott of foreign-made (British) goods.

Jawaharlal Nehru, India's first prime minister, saw India's future as a modern, technologically developed nation and did not agree with Gandhi's vision.

Gandhi was also devastated when demands resurged for all Muslims to be deported to Pakistan, and when Muslim and Hindu leaders expressed frustration and an inability to come to terms with one another.

Gandhi and the entire Congress Working Committee were arrested in Bombay (Mumbai) by the British on August 9, 1942.

The best-known artistic depiction of Gandhi’s life is the film Gandhi (1982), directed by Richard Attenborough, and starring Ben Kingsley.

In 1996, the Government of India introduced the Mahatma Gandhi series of currency notes in Rupees 5, 10, 20, 50, 100, 500 and 1,000 denomination.

Gandhi wanted the party to focus on winning independence, but he did not interfere when it voted to approve socialism as its goal in post-independence.

Despite their differences and Gandhi’s criticism, Bose won a second term, but left soon after when the All-India leaders resigned en masse in protest of his abandonment of principles introduced by Gandhi.

Gandhi, a young lawyer, was mild-mannered, diffident and politically indifferent.

Gandhi was equally devoted to people, rejecting all caste, class and race distinctions.

Gandhi was held for two years in the Aga Khan Palace in Pune.

Gandhi is best known for his method of nonviolent resistance, the means to resist the unjust measures of a powerful superordinate.

Gandhi never received the Nobel Peace Prize, though he was nominated for it five times between 1937 and 1948.

The viceroy refused, and Congress called on Gandhi to lead them.

Gandhi had urged the boycott of all things British, including educational institutions, law courts, government employment, British titles and honours.

Gandhi then organized protests and strikes against the landlords, who finally agreed to more pay and allowed the farmers to determine what crops to grow.

At the conclusion of the war the situation in South Africa deteriorated and Gandhi was called back in late 1902.

The government of India awards the annual Mahatma Gandhi Peace Prize to distinguished social workers, world leaders and citizens.

Gandhi’s hope was that this would encourage discipline and dedication in the freedom movement and weed out the unwilling and ambitious.

The public outcry over the harsh methods of the South African government in response to the peaceful Indian protesters finally forced South African General Jan Christian Smuts to negotiate a compromise with Gandhi.

At a mass protest meeting in Johannesburg, Gandhi, for the first time, called on his fellow Indians to defy the new law rather than resist it through violence.

Younger leaders Subhas Chandra Bose and Jawaharlal Nehru called for immediate independence, whereas Gandhi wanted to allow two years.

Gandhi felt his vow of sexual abstinence gave him a joy and freedom from “slavery to my own appetite” that he otherwise would not have known.

Six days after returning from England, Gandhi was arrested and isolated from his followers in an unsuccessful attempt to destroy his influence.

In 1921, the Indian National Congress invested Gandhi with executive authority.

Gandhi thought that Hitler's hatred could be transformed by Jewish non-violent resistance, stating they should have willingly gone to their deaths as martyrs.

Gandhi's ideal of cottage industry, self-sufficiency and a return to a traditional Indian lifestyle has been criticized by some as impractical.

Gandhi has also been criticized by various historians and commentators for his attitudes regarding Hitler and Nazism.

Meanwhile, without Gandhi, the Indian National Congress had split into two factions.

Other dramas explore the troubled relationship with his eldest son, and the rationale and circumstances of Gandhi’s murder.

Gandhi believed that the mind of an oppressor or a bigot could be changed by love and non-violent rejection of wrong actions, while accepting full responsibility for the consequences of the actions.

Gandhi published a popular weekly newspaper, Indian Opinion, from Phoenix, which gave him an outlet for his developing philosophy.

Gandhi and the nationalists faced a new campaign of repression under Lord Irwin's successor, Lord Willingdon.