Mohandas Gandhi`s Use of Nonviolent Methods to Achieve Independence

That was Gandhi’s turning point in his life. He wanted to earn the same rights as everyone else, he wanted everyone to be equal. He created an independence movement to do this, but violence broke out in the process. For this Gandhi ended his movement. He was sentenced to six years in prison in 1922 but, was then released in 1924 after he underwent an operation for appendicitis.

Mohandas Gandhi was born in 1869 in the Indian coastal city of Porbandar (Background Essay). He then studied law in London, where he noticed that Indians were expected to imitate their rulers, the Englishmen (Background Essay). Gandhi wanted all people to live free, even those imposed by India’s caste system so he decided to take action in a peaceful manner (Background Essay). By doing so he was able to gain India’s independence in 1947 (Background Essay). This caused Gandhi to be known as “ Mahatma” or “ Great Soul” because he was able to do it without violence (Background Essay). Gandhi’s nonviolent movement worked because he accepted the consequences to his actions, strived for fairness to all mankind, and didn’t think of the British as enemies.

Gandhi’s efforts mostly called for a change to the life of those considered to belong to a lower class. As a very well educated individual, he disowned his sophisticated attire and embraced poor man’s traditional loincloth, making his own clothes and doing his own chores. In the process of fighting for equality, Gandhi was arrested, imprisoned, and physically abused on several occasions throughout his life. These encounters gave him the title of a visionary and a leader to many, including friends, and eventually fellow members of the Indian and South African community.

British rule was tough on many Indians. Gandhi, an Indian born lawyer, believed in freedom and peace for his people. He once experienced racism when he was kicked out of a train in Europe. He changed people’s point of view without breaking the law, which was tough for him. Gandhi made his nonviolent movement work through the use of determination, peaceful civil disobedience, and being a powerful leader.

Mohandas Gandhi was born on October 2, 1869 in Porbandar India to a Hindu father and Jainist mother. His very religious mother was a practitioner of Vaishnavism (worship of the Hindu god Vishnu). Influenced by his mother's beliefs Gandhi was governed by self-discipline and nonviolence. He soon got married and sailed off to study law. When Gandhi returned he was in shock of what had happened to India, in just 1 year. Gandhi's beliefs never changed and he still strongly believed in self-discipline and nonviolence. He wanted to make a change in India’s cultures. And that’s exactly what he did, he made the change he saw in the world. Gandhi used many tactics to get India's independence, such as Civil disobedience, embracing the enemy, and acceptance of jail time.

He had a mission to fight the “deep disease of color prejudice”. This was aimed at India’s discrimination, among others. Gandhi was driven to undertake his mission because he had witnessed horrible acts of discrimination from being told to take his turban off to being forcibly thrown off of a train. Gandhi was very successful in accomplishing his mission, as he achieved worldwide recognition for his peaceful methods, and became a “beacon of hope for the oppressed and marginalized people around the world.” The peaceful activist eventually was assassinated by a Muslim extremist, but left a worldwide legacy and even influenced Martin Luther King Jr.’s peaceful

After he graduated law school, he went to Africa and lived there for 20 years; however, Indians and non-whites were treated poorly, like in the southern United States. He believed this was wrong, and sought out to peacefully solve the problem, using his method of “Satyagraha.” Once he started though, he discovered a problem: Africa was a British colony at the time. The British rule was ultimately leading to racial tension, so he decided to peacefully protest against British rule. “Gandhi helped people realize that they needed independence from Britain” (StudySync). Although while he was doing this, trouble was brewing in India. The British were trying to pay off their national debt, so they made a monopoly for salt saled and taxed salt heavily in India. The citizens of india where outraged, because salt was an important part in their diet, and many families no longer could afford it. Gandhi desided to use his methood of peaceful protesting to try and free India from the rule of the British. He then started the Salt March, a long march to the sea to protest against the British. “...Gandhi reached down and picked up a small lump of natural salt out of the mud–and British law had been defied…. Civil disobedience broke out all across India, soon involving millions of Indians, and British authorities arrested more than 60,000 people. Gandhi himself was arrested on May 5, but the satyagraha continued

When Gandhi got there he was instantaneously was put into racism, he was thrown off the train, and was insulted. Gandhi decided to work to change South Africa in the development of it; he was arrested and sent to jail many. Soon after his help in South Africa, he returned to India in 1896.

It was during this time Gandhi was asked “how will you stand by your principle of nonviolence as the whites become more agitated?” Utilizing his fundamental nonviolent philosophy he replied that he was not angry at the British. His only intent was to influence change in them. His faith in God and his desire to right the wrongs made it possible for him to continue a nonviolent struggle regardless of what the British did to him. He did not believe in an eye for an eye which was clearly stated by his nonviolent protest.

So he decided to become a lawyer and go to a prestigious British law school. Later in life when he is traveling on a train in 1900 in South Africa, he is discriminated against because he is black. This is an eye opening moment for Gandhi because he has never experienced racism first hand before. He considered himself to be a well-respected and educated man but this does not matter one bit to the officers. All they see is that he is black and s they throw him out of first class. He then realizes the power of the British and decides that he is going to resist this racism but not in a violent way. This is very pivotal because it has never been done before. Gandhi was the first person to figure out that this way of action would actually work because of something called hard power and soft power. Hard power is force and physical harm to make people do what you want and soft power is just the opposite. When one of the powers is lessened the other becomes greater. Understanding this principal is the reason that Gandhi’s way of fighting worked and he ended up winning in the

Gandhi, in the story showed how if people can come together, how strong we could be together.

Aroused by the massacre of Amritsar in 1919, Gandhi devoted his life to gaining India’s independence from Great Britain. As the dominant figure used his persuasive philosophy of non-violent confrontation, he inspired political activists with many persuasions throughout the world (Andrews 23). Not only was Mahatma Gandhi a great peacemaker, but also his work to achieve freedom and equality for all people was greatly acknowledged. Gandhi’s unconventional style of leadership gained him the love of a country and eventually enabled him to lead the independence movement in India.

He married at the early age of 13. Once he finished elementary school, he attended an all-boys high school. After high school, he decided to leave India and went to study law in London. After finishing the 4 years and passing the bar exam he went back to India. He was first employed nonviolent civil disobedience as an expatriate lawyer in South Africa, in the resident nation community struggle for civil rights. Gandhi’s goal was for India to gain independence from the British Empire. He fought British tyranny. Although fighting for the independence of India, this wasn’t the only civil rights movement he was involved in. He spent 20 years in South Africa opposing institutional discrimination against Indians. Following Indian independence in 1947, Gandhi attempted to mediate the Hindu-Muslim conflict in Bengal. He was assassinated in

When he was young, Mahatma Gandhi was largely sheltered and ignorant of the injustice done to the Indians and other colored races. When he was 17, a priest recommended that he go to study in London and thus have a better chance of becoming the Chief Secretary of their province. Although, most of his other neighbours and family tried to dissuade him, he ended up in London where he studied law to become a barrister. This decision to go across the sea to another land opened up the door to his eventual position as a world revered leader by distancing him from his homeland and offering him a new perspective, and exposing him to the unjust treatment of his people. Furthermore, when he arrived in South Africa to become a temporary lawyer for an Indian firm, his decision to stay and help the Indian community there developed his leadership skills and nurtured his morals and ethics, furthering his progress to his position as a leader of a

“I object to violence because when it appears to do good, the good is only temporary; the evil it does is permanent.”(Gandhi). In Gandhi’s quote, he is saying when leaders think violence and war will solve their problem and get the point across, the problem will not go away, but ironically it will only make the situation worse. To Mohandas Gandhi, the proper way of living life was through being peaceful and nonviolent, not by being distasteful and incompatible. Gandhi was the distinguished leader of India’s independence movement to gain their freedom from Britain through nonviolent resistance. The mood of the Gandhian era was determined due to the fact that Gandhi had his heart set on giving his civilization a goal to find peace. All his satyagrahi followers were determined to achieve freedom through civil disobedience. Gandhi’s movements and campaigns were all executed through passive resistance. Philosophers thought Gandhi was naive for believing peace and nonviolence would conquer all, but Gandhi’s ideas and movements served as a catalyst for his satyagrahi followers to reflect on their activism towards political peace.