The Small Man Who Led a Big Nation
Mahatma Gandhi was a national icon for the people of India between the years 1869 and 1948. He is still remembered all over the world today. To follow the path of Gandhi one must traverse all regions of India, from the houses of the highest officials to the poorest villages where the word poverty does injustice. Gandhi led a fearless resistance against the British government, that oppressed his people, and an endless pilgrimage to lift the spirits of his people(the people of India) to maturity. Gandhi was very unique in his approach as he preached non-violence and led a life similar to that of the most downtrodden people of India.
Gandhi was
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Gandhi interacted with a diversified group of Indians while in Africa. He learned about many different injustices Indians suffered from in Africa and in India. As his beliefs in satyagraha solidified his reputation began to spread into India. It was about this time in 1914 that Gandhi returned to India.
The people of India, who were discouraged with Britain’s policies, eagerly waited for Gandhi’s return. They had been showing dissent towards the government on a small scale, but they needed Gandhi’s political initiative and leadership. The British would not share industrial secrets, levied high taxes, restricted industrial investment, and limited any kind of economic advancement for the Indians.(Spodek 667). Gandhi began to assist several protests that had been initiated against the British and got the Indians to participate in hartals. These hartals are similar to sit down strikes. At one sit down in 1919 the Indians were protesting the Rowlatt Acts. The British decided that they would show their power and killed 379 people and injured over1100. This is when Gandhi and all of India proclaimed “non cooperation” with Britain.
This action by the British led to two things: a new vigorous political movement and a grassroots spiritual revival, both led by Gandhi. Gandhi rallied his Congress and people into a mass movement. He “emerged as a leader offering new
Mahatma Gandhi: Gandhi was born in Porbandar, India in 1869 and died in 1948. He was western educated, specifically trained in England. Although he was a nationalist, he was anti-modern because he was skeptical to industrialism. He believed in the ideal of satyagraha, the non-tolerance of evil, but also the understanding that violence is not the answer to that evil. He also believed in non-violence. He did not cooperate with anything British, specifically trading with the British, British schooling or products, and even paying taxes to the British. He served as a civil rights activist after being thrown off a train when refusing to move from his seat in first class. He became the leading member of Congress Party in the 1930’s and shortly after participated in the March to Sea for salt during the British imposed salt tax. Every single aspect of Gandhi’s life was peaceful, if the people around him decided to disobey and use violence as a means of getting what they wanted, Gandhi would take it upon himself to fast. He was eventually assassinated by a Hindus
Mahatma Gandhi changed India’s history forever through disobedience. Even though he disobeyed the law he had a good reason to. India was under the British rule and the people were doing as british were telling them to do because they had no other option. Gandhi was the one who didn’t do as the british said, but instead stood against it because he knew that what they were doing was unfair. As he have said, “A man who was completely innocent, offered himself as a sacrifice for the good of others, including his enemies, and became the ransom of the world. It was a perfect act”. He disobeyed the british laws to free
Mahatma Gandhi is a trailblazer for change thru nonviolent resistance and compassion for others, even for his oppressors, that made a large impact on the world.
Gandhi was an Indian lawyer, politician, social activist and writer who would lead the independence movement of India to free the country of British rule (“Mahatma Gandhi,” 2017). He would prove that a single person could change the course of history and take on the entire British Empire. Gandhi’s principles of nonviolence and civil disobedience are attributed to his success in gaining independence for India. The act of passive resistance allowed Gandhi to generate more support for his movement for independence while making it difficult for the British to find reasons to arrest them. He argued that although violence could be more effective than peaceful
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.
In 1757, Great Britain extended its empire into India. This occupation would not fully end until 1947. In the time between, there were many movements by the Indian people to gain independence from the British. The movement that finally succeeded in winning India’s independence was led by one of the most influential figures of the 20th century, Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi. Gandhi’s methods for fighting against the occupation of the British were very different from those of any of the freedom movements before. And that was why it worked. Gandhi did not agree with the general reasoning of the time: that conflicts could be solved through negotiation and forceful resistance.1 Rather, his faith led him to go
He outed the moral and political philosophy of satyagraha, or nonviolent resistance, which he had developed while in South Africa. His message to Indians was simple: develop your own resources and control the instincts and activities that encourage membership in colonial economy and government, and you shall achieve swaraj or self-rule. Faced with Indian self-reliance and self-control pursued nonviolently, Gandhi claimed, the British eventually would have to leave. When the Depression struck India in 1930, Gandhi asked for his people not to use salt showing his new way of civil disobedience. Salt symbolized tasked the Indians' defeat to an alien government. To break the colonial government's control, Gandhi began a 240-mile march from western India to the coast to gather sea salt for free. With him were seventy-one followers representing different regions of India. Thousands of people met around and encouraging them to hold independence from British rule. (Pollard, Rosenberg, Tignor 2015 Pages
M.K. Gandhi was an Indian who protested successfully against Britain and ultimately influenced future events around the world. Gandhi’s most successful tactic to gain Indian independence was “Satyagraha” or passive resistance because the majority of society would disagree with the opponent, they will continue to protest no matter what, and it was successfully used in the Salt March. Firstly, using this tactic, about 80 Indian citizens were publically brutalized by British authorities which greatly influenced the world against them because an eyewitness wrote and sent thousands of newspapers, talking about British police brutality, around the world. For example, in Source 3 the text says, “Webb Miller’s eyewitness account was published in over a thousand newspapers around the world.”
This experience in his time in South Africa prepared him to lead India’s independence movement because it helped him become aware of the racial prejudice and exploitation of Indians in South Africa. By him witnessing the racial prejudice in South Africa, he then organized the Indian émigrés in order to protect their interests. As a result, Gandhi developed a basic understanding and experience on how to organize masses of people under a single goal of liberating themselves from foreign oppression that existed in both South Africa and India. This experience in addition to his knowledge on law would aid him to become a respectful leader as he took part in an active independent movement based on nonviolent
The Indians were starting to feel as if their country wasn't theirs anymore. Poor farmers and other hard-working would work all day long just for the british who were forcing them to do so.Whenever someone would raise their voice they would end up in jail. Indians would start to wonder why they were so civilized by another nation. For some time the only power british had to keep the Indians quite was to start putting people in jail.some would be afraid of that and some would not even speak, But Gandhi wasn't one of them, he didn't want to stay quiet and watch them rule India.One of the examples was when Gandhi wanted to repeal the taxes,the salt march in particular, he was a very brave to speak up but once again he was sent to jail. Indians didn't think it was such a great Idea to send someone to jail without any official court orders. They would rally outside jails and finally the British signed an agreement to repeal some taxes. The British would have a sudden fear that if they still rallied outside the jail they would probably have to do even more of repealing taxes. But I am pretty sure it wasn't the last time Gandhi was sent to
Mohandas Gandhi, the leader of India’s independence movement in the early 1900s, inspired many with his use of civil disobedience to bring about change in society. Gandhi was an educated individual who studied law in London and worked in South Africa. Here, he experienced discrimination first hand due to British individual's sense of superiority caused by the concept of social darwinism. This lead to him advocating for equality and later transgressed to the liberation of India, who was at that time under Britain’s control. His method of promoting change through civil disobedience was so revolutionary in a time where violence was so prominent, and was able to capture the astonishing resilience of Indians against British oppression.
Gandhi, in the story showed how if people can come together, how strong we could be together.
During World War I, Gandhi had an active part in recruiting campaigns by launching his new movement of non-violent resistance to Great Britain (Byers 202). When Parliament passed the Rowlatt Acts in 1919, Satyagraha, which means insistence on truth, spread throughout India, recruiting millions of followers. British soldiers massacred Indians at Amritsar as a demonstration against the Rowlatt Acts. In 1920 the British government failed to make peace, which resulted in Gandhi organizing a campaign of non-cooperation (Andrews 103). There was chaos in India as the public
This was the spark. The Indians not longer loyal to Britain, and became nationalist. There were many methods Gandhi used to defend human rights. Mohandas Gandhi led India to independence after Amritsar Massacre. He follows hinduism but uses ideas from all religions. He asked the Indians to follow civil disobedience , which is refusal to obey laws. His idea was to use passive resistance, or non violence. One movement was The Homespun Movement. The Indians boycotted British cloth. They decided to weave their own cloth at home. Next was The Salt March. It was a peaceful protest British tax on salt. The Indians could only buy salt from the British and had to pay taxes on it. Gandhi and his followers protested by walking 240 miles to the coast to make their own salt. Newspapers across the world spread the news. Gandhi gained worldwide support. Eventually 60,000 Indians were arrested. Last was The Quit India Movement. Gandhi’s calls for Britain to give India immediate independence by asking all indians to leave jobs. Indians refused to fight in WWII, teachers stopped teaching, other Indians left their jobs. This movement was successful. There were many effects of the indian independence
The leather sandals slipped from his feet. Mahatma Gandhi's devoted his life mainly to help others, in Ahimsa, non-violence and Hindu - Muslim riots, he was largely inspired by the Gita- the Hindu holy book. Basically he believed everyone should have equal rights. His successes in life were when he studied law in England, got a job in South Africa, when he did the salt march, identified him self with the untouchables- which are India's poorest people.