BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH

Albert Einstein famously said of Gandhi, "Generations to come, it may be, will scarcely believe that such a one as this ever in flesh and blood walked upon this earth."

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was a man considered one of the great sages and prophets. He was held as another Buddha, another Jesus, Indians called him the ‘Father of the Nation’. They showered their love, respect and devotion on him in an unprecedented measure. They thronged his way to have a glimpse of him, to hear one world from his lips. They applied on their foreheads the dust on the path he had trodden. For them, he was almost an incarnation of God, who had come to break the chains of their slavery. The whole world bowed to him in reverence. Even his opponents held him in great respect.Mahatma Gandhi was born in Porbandar, India on October 2, 1869. He was the youngest of three sons and books were his only companions. His father and grandfather were great men of principle while his mother was very religious. They influenced his life immensely and they raised him to put virtue before wealth. At the tender age of thirteen he had an arranged marriage. In 1887 Gandhi left India to go to England to study law. His mother made him promise that he practices abstinence to wine, women and meat before she gave her blessing for him to leave. In England he joined a vegetarian society and was introduced to the Bible there. The Sermon on the Mount was his favorite reading and he expanded himself to study the principles of world religions. He traveled to South Africa as a barrister in 1893 and signed a one-year contract, however he remained there over twenty years. During his time there he fought for racial unity and the end to race prejudice. Gandhi lived by his convictions and persuaded others to follow simplicity, harmony, non-violence, and humanitarian efforts. In 1903 he set up office to be an attorney in Johannesburg and wrote his own newspaper for the Indian people called, “The Indian Opinion.” Because of his belief in non-violent civil disobedience to react to an injustice of prejudice he was sent to prison in 1908. Gandhi expressed he much rather be a political prisoner to stop the Anti-Asiatic declaration then to allow it to happen so he used passive resistance as his weapon. Gandhi was asked to write an autobiography midway through his career. In his farewell speech at the end of book he stresses the spirit of truth will bring happiness and peace. He ends it with, “So long as a man does not of his own free will put himself last among his fellow creatures, there is no salvation for him.”

Mahatma Gandhi as everyone knows was a dynamic freedom fighter but he has not only tried to get freedom of the country from British rule but also freedom from internal disturbances. He worked as journalist much before he was known as freedom fighter. Mahatma Gandhi, in a journalistic career spanning nearly four decades, edited six journals. He ensured that his daily “outpourings of heart and soul” reached all. Young India, Indian Opinion, Navjeevan, Harijan, Harijan Sevak, Harijan Bandhu all are to his credit as a journalist. Again there are many works to his credit as a writer. Some are in the form of books and some of them are the compiled works .Some important works are as following:

Books written by Gandhi:

My Experiments With Truth(Autobiography),Hind Swaraj or Indian Home Rule, Key to Health

Compilation of his works:

A Gandhi Anthology-Part I, A Gandhi Anthology Part-II, All Men are Brothers, From Yervada Mandir (Ashram Observances), My Views on Education, Mohan Mala, India of My Dream, Discourses on Gita, Selected Letters, Teachings of Gandhi, The Law and the Lawyers, Gandhiji Expects, Truth is God, The essence of Hinduism, The Way to Communal Harmony, Village Swaraj, Pathway to God, Panchayat Raj, The Mind of Mahatma Gandhi, Towards new Education, Trusteeship, My Views on Education, The Words of Gandhi, Character and Nation Building, Ethical Religion ,Diet and Diet Reform, Essential Work of Mahatma Gandhi(Vol. 1),Collective Works of Mahatma Gandhi (Vol. 1 to 100),My Religion, Nature Cure, Unto the Last etc.

In 1947 India got independence under the guidance of Mahatma Gandhi. But Gandhi's last months were shadowed by communal strife between Hindu and Muslim. When he walked barefoot through the scorched villages in East Bengal, locals strewed shattered glass on his path. Gandhi pleaded for amicable settlement between India and Pakistan, but on January 30, 1948, he was assassinated in Delhi on his way to an evening prayer. A young Hindu Brahmin, named Nathuram Godse, viewed Gandhi's acceptance of partition as a betrayal of the Hindu population, and fired three shots point-blank. Gandhi had not allowed police to search people near him. Godse believed that the prayer and the purity of the mind were signs of superstitions and without the "father of the nation" India would free to follow the course founded on reason.

"Even Gandhi, with all his charisma, did not melt the hearts of his oppressors, as he had hoped. After softening, hearts harden again. Asoka too was wrong to think that he was changing the course of history, and that his righteousness would last 'as long as the sun and the moon'."

Mahatma Gandhi was a modern messiah whose life became the message to the world. The message was truth and freedom through non-violence. Non violence is the most beautiful gift mankind has ever received since the existence of civilized evolution.

Violence, wars, terrorism and human injustice are the focus of the central issues of world problems. The constructive aspects of Mahatma Gandhi's philosophy can regenerate a world bordering on the chaos. Gandhiji’s altruistic Philosophy may appear to be an utopian ideal.However, if we want to find permanent solutions to life’s problems, it is essential to adopt universal welfare as a central percept. Today Mahatma Gandhi is no more a person, he has become a phenomenon. In his lifetime he fought for many causes; colonialism, racial discrimination, economic exploitation and India's Independence, but predominantly he fought for human rights which was the pivot of his existence. His weapons were Satya (truth) and Ahimsa (non-violence). Gandhiji's entire life was a powerful message for mankind. His every breath was dedicated to the pursuit of truth (god), in its most pristine manifestations, justice and liberty for man.

MY EXPERIMENTS WITH TRUTH

Truth alone will endure; all the rest will be swept away before the tide of time

M.K Gandhi’s autobiography MY EXPERIMENTS WITH TRUTH is written in Augustan style , all of the incidents narrated being confessional. But all those incidents as the title goes are his experiments with truth. He has given complete picture of his life highlighting all aspects-physical (his experiments with dietics and naturopathy), intellectual (his meeting with Gokhale and other dignitaries, morals (his internal conflicts and compromises with Kasturba his wife.),and spiritual (indomitable faith in God. Thought and writing were always tools with him for more efficient action. They were used either to clear up a knotty problem in his own mind or in that of his co-workers. His writings therefore exactly give a correct representation of what he actually was but what he always tried to be. It is a record of ideals and aspirations and of criticism of events and situations in the light of those ideals. By their very nature they reflect the difficulties which confronted him from time to time and also how he was able to met them more or less successful in the course of life's experiments. Gandhi’s autobiography, which he had titled ‘My experiments with Truth’ can be rated as one of the most popular and the most influential books in the recent history. It was written at the instance of Swami Anand. It appeared in the Weekly ‘Navjivan’ during 1925-28. It covers Gandhi’s life up to 1920. He did not cover the period after that as it was well known to the people and most of the concerned persons were alive. Besides he felt that his experiments in that period were yet to yield definite conclusions.

Gandhi’s autobiography is very different from other autobiographies. The autobiographies normally contain self-praise by the authors. They want to criticize their opponents and boost their own image in the people’s eyes. Gandhi’s autobiography is completely free from all this. It is marked with humility and truthfulness. He had not hidden anything. In fact, he is rather too harsh on himself. He did not want to show to the world how good he was. He only wanted to tell the people the story of his experiments with Truth.

Truth, for Gandhi, was the supreme principle, which includes many other principles. Realization of the Truth is the purpose of human life. Gandhi always strove to realize the Truth. He continuously tried to remove impurities in himself. He always tried to stick to the Truth as he knew and to apply the knowledge of the Truth to everyday life. He tried to apply the spiritual principles to the practical situations. He did it in the scientific spirit. Sticking to the truth means Satyagraha. Gandhi therefore called his experiments as ‘Experiments with Truth’ or ‘Experiments in the science of Satyagraha.’ Gandhi also requested the readers to treat those experiments as illustrative and to carry out their own experiments in that light.

The greatest quality about this book is one it shares with most of Gandhi's writing: when he writes you get the sense that he is giving us his unedited thoughts. During even the greatest crises in his struggle for Indian independence, Gandhi's writings have the quality of a transcription of what he is thinking. More than any figure I can think of, Gandhi revealed precisely what he was thinking. The book assumes that the reader is aware of contemporary happenings. Also the book is full of people and detailed incidents e.g., Gandhi has not given any introduction about Indian National Congress and directly speaks about his involvement with the party. The sequence of the happenings in his life is really interesting and worthy of being written as a book. Gandhi is arrested in Champaran as his arrival in the village caused tension. He is fined by the court but he refuses to pay. Judges and police get frightened at the number of people collected outside the court in support of Gandhi and so they release him without any fine. Many such incidents seem like movie story

Important people subjects and places:

He has given complete picture of his life highlighting all aspects. His experiments with dietics and naturopathy, his internal conflicts and compromises with his wife kasturba and his friends attempt to convert him from Hindu to either Christianity or Islam was interesting. The book gives us a glimpse of then South Africa and the seriousness of the problem of apartheid. Description of his country wide tour of India gives us a good picture of conditions existing then. His various meetings with famous people like Gokhale, Tilak, Vallabh bhai patel, Motilal Nehru,Jawaharlal Nehru etc shows us how India was full of stalwarts.

Narration Style :

This book is more of a confession than an autobiography, true to the title indeed. Narration style is interesting enough to keep the reader involved with the book for e.g., the incident where Gandhi refuses to copy in a test despite his teacher asking him to do it. In an interesting way Gandhi has told us not to cheat with our conscience. The book never seems boring and language used is simple. So there is no much use of a dictionary. The book is rather rigid and text-book like. It has started with a beautiful introduction and ended by one page caption---farewell.

Comparison:
The style of writing here is different from that of Jawaharlal Nehru’s "Discovery of India". While "My experiments with truth" is simple and deals with the practical problems of daily existence, "Discovery of India" is scholarly and poetic as the phrases like "waxing and waning of the moon", and other idioms are used. This is quite in keeping with the contrasting personalities of Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru. While both were sincere to the cause of India’s freedom, Gandhi was humble and practical while Nehru was a dreamer and impulsive.Mahatma Gandhi is arguably one of the most influential and respected figures in modern history. Biographies, documentaries and films have portrayed him. But this book is his own and offers an insight into his mind and soul. He talks of the experiences that have shaped his thinking, where he has gone wrong and the lessons he has learnt.

HIND SWARAJ OR INDIAN HOME RULE

“In my opinion it is a book which can be put into the hands of a child. It teaches the gospel of love in place of that of hate. It replaces violence with self-sacrifice. It pits soul force against brute force.”

HIND SWARAJ, the title of the first definitive writing of Mahatma Gandhi, and which continues to evoke critical interest the world over even now, literally means ‘self-rule in India’. This small book of about 30,000 words was written in Gujarat in November 1909 on board the ship during Gandhi's return trip from England to South Africa after an abortive mission, within 10 days, 40 of the 275 pages being written with left hand. As stated by Gandhiji himself: "I wrote the entire Hind Swaraj for my dear friend Dr. Pranjivan Mehta. All the argument in the book is reproduced almost as it took place with him."It was published in the Indian Opinion in Natal and was soon banned by Government in India because it contained 'matter declared to be seditious'. On that, Gandhi published the English translation from Natal to show the innocuous nature of its contents. The ban was finall lifted on 21 December 1938.

A number of editions have been published thereafter, the most common being that published by Navjivan press in India in 1938 with the title 'Hind Swaraj: the Indian Home Rule'. In 1924, an American edition, called 'Sermon on the Sea', (Intro. by John Haynes Holmes) was published from Chicago. Recently, a Reader on it has been published under the 'Cambridge Texts in Modem politics', edited by Professor Anthony J. Parel of University of Calgary (Canada) in 1997.

The book has 20 chapters and 2 appendices. Appendix I lists twenty references for further reading, including six by Tolstoy, two by Thoreau, two by Ruskin, one by Plato (Defence and Death of Socrates), and one by Mazzini (Duties of Man), and one each by Dadabhai Navroji, and R. C. Dutt on the economic condition of colonial India.In this book Gandhi basically tried to enlighten the people with the true meaning of Swaraj. As he has written "In effect it means this: that we want English rule without the Englishman. You want the tiger's nature, but not the tiger; that is to say, you would make India English. And when it becomes English, it will be called not Hindustan but Englistan. This is not the Swaraj that I want."

In this book Gandhi has also emphasized on the role of newspapers and their true object. As he pointed out,"One of the objects of a newspaper is to understand popular feeling and to give expression to it; another is to arouse among the people certain desirable sentiments; and the third is fearlessly to expose popular defects."

Gandhi has never tried to impose his personal views by writing but he always tried to explain that he is teaching nothing new. He just experimented all the old principles in his life. So he has written “I have nothing new to teach the world. Truth and Nonviolence are as old as the hills. All I have done is to try experiments in both on as vast a scale as I could. In doing so I have sometimes erred and learnt by my errors. Life and its problems have thus become to me so many experiments in the practice of truth and nonviolence. As a Jain muni once rightly said, I was not so much a votary of ahimsa as I was of truth, and I put the latter in the first place and the former in the second. For, as he put it, I was capable of sacrificing nonviolence for the sake of Truth. In fact it was in the course of my pursuit of truth that I discovered nonviolence.”

So, in this book also Gandhi has done marvelous job as a writer by enlightening the readers with truth and non-violence and also suggested the duties of media in a country.

GANDHI ON EDUCATION

Real education consists in drawing the best out of yourself. What better book can there be than the book of humanity? Harijan: March 30, 1934.

By education I mean an all-round drawing out of the best in child and man - body, mind and spirit. Harijan: July 31, 1937.

Gandhi frequently asserted that mass illiteracy is a curse that hampers the development of a nation. He wrote: "I am a firm believer in the principle of free and compulsory primary education for India". Gandhi felt that education should not only increase knowledge but also develop culture in heart and hand. Another of Gandhi's interests lay in character building. Education without character building was not education according to him. He considered a strong character as the basic of a good citizen. So the issues of character building through value-based education on the one hand and that of integrating science and technology on the other hand have to go together. So we, in the contemporary situation, have to draw a balanced evaluation of science because its progress has a great role to play in determining the directions of value education.

In order to bring about social change we have to channelize the human values through education. Truth and non-violence can generate human values. Declaring the importance of non-violence, he said: "Non-violence is the first article of my faith. It is also the last article of my creed." He further added: “Without Ahimsa it is not possible to seek and find truth, Ahimsa and truth are so interwined that it is practically impossible.”Gandhi has emphasized on the importance of true or what he called real education basically in all his works but Harijan and Young India are the most remarkable work in this context.

CONCLUSION:

Gandhi’s works are much more sacred than all other religious books, for there we find only words but here we find those words being implemented. Gandhi has paved a way to lead a prosperous and successful life. Each and every word written by him contains the essence of the life. He who writes is not a writer. He whose writing has been his life and who has made his life his writing is he who only is called a writer. Gandhi was a true writer who has written nothing beyond the reality. He himself implemented all that he has written then he expected from the people to behave in the same way. As he said also “You must be the change you wish to see in the world.”

BIBLIOGRAPHY/WEBLIOGRAPHY/

REFERENCES:

ARTICLES

1. Devraj,P.I. and Shyamla K., Relevance of Gandhian Ideals in The Scheme of Value Education at http://www.mkgandhi-sarvodya.org as last accessed on 4^th Feb 2011

2. Homer A. Jack The Gandhi Reader: A Sourcebook of His Life and Writings

3. Judith Brown Gandhi: Prisoner of Hope

4. Kaushik, Anupma Gandhi on Gender Violence and Gender Equality: An Overview at http://www.mkgandhi.com last accessed on 5 Feb 2011.

5. Lester, Muriel Gandhi Leader at http://www.cite-HR.com as last accessed on 8^th Feb 2011

6. West ,Albert In The Early Days With Gandhi at http://www.mkgandhi-sarvodaya.org as last accessed on 4^th Feb 2011

BOOKS

1. A Fire That Blazed In The Ocean : Gandhi And The Poems Of Satyagraha In South Africa, 1909-1911 : Surendra Bhana and Neelima Shukla - Bhatt, Bibliophile South Asia, 2011

2. A Frank Friendship : Gandhi and Bengal: A Descriptive Chronology : Edited by Gopalkrishna Gandhi, Seagull Books, 2007

3. A Selections from Harijan : Gandhiji Speaks to the Media : Edited by Arjun Goswami, Sagnik Books

4. Akhtarul Wasey and Farhat Ehsas (2008) Education Gandhi and Man : Select Writings Khwaja Ghulamus Saiyyadain : Shipra Publications

5. Anil Dutta Mishra(2003) ,Challenges of 21 Century : Gandhian Alternatives : Mittal Publication

6. Arvind Sharma, D.K. Printworld,( 2005 )A New Curve in the Ganges Mahatma Gandhi's Interpretation of Hinduism

7. C.C. Biswas(2004)Bengal's Response to Gandhi : Minerva Associates

8. Catching Up With Gandhi : Graham Turner, Penguin, 2010

9. Ch. Prema Kumar (2010) Gandhi : A Humanistic Model : , Akansha Publications,New Delhi

10. Chadha, Y. (1997) Rediscovering Gandhi, London: Century.

11. Edited by B S Bibhuti (2008) : Celebrating Satyagraha, Academic Excellence

12. Emergence of Mahatma Gandhi : 1915-1919 : S. Ram and R. Kumar, Commonwealth Publications

13. Gandhi : A Political and Spiritual Life : Kathryn Tidrisk, Viva Books, 2008,

14. Gandhi, Mahatma (2008)Conquest of Self ,Abhishek Publications

15. Gandhi, Mahatma ,From Yeravda Mandir (Ashram Observances),Navjeevan Publications, Ahemdabad

16. Gandhi, Mahatma(1997) ,Hind Swaraj or Indian Home Rule ,Navjeevan Publication, Ahemdabad

17. Gandhi,Mahatma, Key To Health,Navjeevan Publications, Ahemdabad

18. Gandhi,Mahatma, My Experiments with truth: An Autobiography, Navjeevan Publication, Ahemdabad

19. Gandhi,Mahatma,The Essence of Hinduism, Navjeevan Publications, Ahemdabad

20. Hunt James D.(2009) An American Looks at Gandhi : Essays in Satyagraha, Civil Rights and Peace : Promilla and Co.

21. Jain Vaishali (2009) Crisis in Indian Democracy and Gandhian Alternative : , Regal

22. K.S. Bharathi,(2008) Encyclopedia of Gandhian Thought Vol. VI

23. Kapoor A.N. , Gupta V.P. and Gupta Mohini ,(2007)Cross-Currents of Indian History and Culture, Vol. VII : The Gandhian Era : , Radha Publication

24. Kumar, K. (1994) 'Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi' in Z. Morsy (ed.) Thinkers on Education Volume 2, Paris: UNESCO.

25. Kumaraswami, Anand ,Gandhi on Personal Leadership, Jaico Publishing House, Mumbai, India

26. 'Let's Kill Gandhi!' : A Chronicle of His Last Days, the Conspiracy, Murder, Investigation and Trial : Tushar A Gandhi, Rupa, 2007

27. Mishra, Anil Dutta , Jha Saroj Kumar and Tater Sohan Raj ,(2010) A Chronological Biography of Mahatma Gandhi :Abhijeet Publications,New Delhi

28. Prasad Nand Kishore (2010) Economic Vision of Mahatma Gandhi : ABD Publications

29. R K Pruthi and Chaturvedi Archna (2008)Encyclopedia of Gandhian Thought, Vol. I

30. Radha Rajan(2009) ,Eclipse of the Hindu Nation : Gandhi and His Freedom Struggle : , New Age Publications

31. Sharma Rashmi (2004) Autobiographical Writings of Mahatma Gandhi : Deep and Deep

32. T. Hingorani Anand, Gandhi For 21st Century, (Ed.), Vol. 1 to 24

33. Thakur Anil Kumar and Sinha Mithilesh Kumar(2009)Economics of Mahatma Gandhi : Challenges and Development : Deep and Deep Publications

34. Theodore Zeldin in An Intimate History of Humanity, 1994

35. Verma Rajesh (2010) Educational Vision of Mahatma Gandhi : , ABD Publications

WEBLIOGRAPHY

http://www.mksarvodaya.org as last accessed on 8^th Feb 2011

http://www.mkorg.in as last accessed on 4^th Feb 2011

http://www.internetencyclopedia.htm as last accessed on 8^th Feb 2011

http://www.goi.in as last accessed on 20^th Feb 2011

http://www.cie-Hr.com as last accessed on 20^th Feb 2011

Received on 20.02.2012

Revised on 16.03.2012

Accepted on 23.03.2012