Today is Mahatma Gandhi’s 139th birthday. To be honest, for a very long time, I did not believed in Gandhi’s ideology of non-violence and peaceful non-participation of anything you believe is evil. To be fair, the world around us does not make us believe in Gandhivaad. As we are racing ahead, we are so getting consumed with materialism, religious intolerance, and an insatiable appetite for destruction of all things good. If we stop and think about all the things we have done and are continue to do – we would be horrified by our own actions. I’m not saying money or religion is the root of all evil – hell they are the very basis of our survival today. However, materialism and religious fundamentalism have become a part of our social DNA.
As I’ve said that for a very long time I was against Gandhi’s ideology. However, as I’ve grown older (and hopefully little wiser), I’ve realized the fact that Gandhi’s messages are still relevant for modern times that I wonder sometimes – have we really changed (read progressed) in past 50-60 years when Gandhi was fighting against the English Goliath? We may think that we have progressed in terms of lifestyle, knowledge, morals, values, and basic human rights. However, we have also progressed in mass destruction of nature, unprecedented religious fundamentalism, corruption, integrity decay, and consumerism. It is like taking one step forward and two backwards. If we look closely, the world has not changed that much. It’s the skin that has changed, but the skeleton remains the same.
My interest in Gandhi started when I saw Richard Attenborough’s film Gandhi. As a student, we Indians are taught about Indian greats like Gandhi, Nehru, Patel, and Bose. However, being a kid I always used to wonder how a person can protest in a non-violent manner. We always used to have Gandhi versus Bose discussions and in the end Bose always scored over Gandhi in terms of popularity. It is not surprising because as a young man would you really like to get slapped and not hitting back? The answer would be unequivocally NO. If someone hits us, we will hit back. Not like Gandhi who used to offer his other cheek if someone slapped him. A similar scene from the movie really made me take notice of this man. In an incident, (actually the movie was biopic so I would not call it a scene), Gandhi was burning registration certificates and a policeman hits him with a stick. Gandhi falls down and picks up another certificate and burns it. He does it till the time he was beaten unconscious. As a cinematic scene, I was stunned to what I saw and I was absolutely amazed when I realized that this happened for real. Even though Gandhi was not the inventor of “non-violence philosophy” (which I believe is the core value of Hinduism and Buddhism), but he surely was the first modern day practitioner. He re-discovered the power of godly ideas like peace and truth to fight for freedom and injustice. I won’t call him my role model but I surely would like to emulate one quality of him and this is to do what I believe is good.
What you do is of little significance. But it is very important that you do it – Mahatma Gandhi
Thursday, October 2, 2008
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2 comments:
nice post dost..Gandhi was able to unite the vast people of this country with all its variations and different cultures..What he did was not done by anybody in India before and i dont think there will be another Gandhi in atleast next 1000 yrs.
gandhi gave power to ppl and every person following him felt himself to be v v imp..and understood the big cause he was fighting for,...he had lot of leadership and management skills to understand, learn and emulate.
Very true...that we got a lot to learn and emulate.
Albert Einstein once said - Generations to come, it may be, will scarcely believe that such a one, as this, ever in flesh and blood walked upon this earth.
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