Gandhian views for a peaceful world
An individual is the product of the society. All those who are blessed with good things in life should give a bit to make this world a better Place to live in. I feel that Gandhian view would make this very clear ( I am indebted to web resources on Gandhi)
MOHANDAS KARAMCHAND GANDHI
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Gandhian Philosophy in Short: By Mahatma Himself
I know the path. It is straight and narrow. It is like the edge of a sword. I rejoice to walk on it. I weep when I slip. God's word is: 'He who strives never perishes.' I have implicit faith in that promise. Though, therefore, from my weakness I fail a thousand times, I will not lose faith, but hope that I shall see the Light when the flesh has been brought under perfect subjection, as some day it must.
My soul refuses to be satisfied so long as it is a helpless witness of a single wrong or a single misery. But it is not possible for me, a weak, frail, miserable being, to mend every wrong or to hold myself free of blame for all the wrong I see.
The spirit in me pulls one way, the flesh in me pulls in the opposite direction. There is freedom from the action of these two forces, but that freedom is attainable only by slow and painful stages.
I cannot attain freedom by a mechanical refusal to act, but only by intelligent action in a detached manner. This struggle resolves itself into an incessant crucifixion of the flesh so that the spirit may become entirely free.
Search for Truth
I am but a seeker after Truth. I claim to have found a way to it. I claim to be making a ceaseless effort to find it. But I admit that I have not yet found it. To find Truth completely is to realize oneself and one's destiny, i.e., to become perfect. I am painfully conscious of my imperfections, and therein lies all the strength I posses, because it is a rare thing for a man to know his own limitations.
If I was a perfect man, I own I should not feel the miseries of neighbors as I do. As a perfect man I should take note of them, prescribe a remedy, and compel adoption by the force of unchangeable Truth in me. But as yet I only see as through a glass darkly and, therefore, have to carry conviction by slow and laborious processes, and then, too, not always with success.
That being so, I would be less than human if, with all my knowledge of avoidable misery pervading the land and of the sight of mere skeletons under the very shadow of the Lord of the Universe, I did not feel with and for all the suffering but dumb millions of India.86
Trust in God
I am in the world feeling my way to light 'amid the encircling gloom'. I often err and miscalculate My trust is solely in God. And I trust men only because I trust God. If I had no God to rely upon, I should be like Timon, a hater of my species.
I will not be a traitor to God to please the whole world.
Whatever striking things I have done in life, I have not done prompted by reason but prompted by instinct, I would say, God.
I am a man of faith. My reliance is solely on God. One step is enough for me. The next step He will make clear to me when the time for it comes.
No Secrecy
I have no secret methods. I know no diplomacy save that of truth. I have no weapon but non-violence. I may be unconsciously led astray for a while, but not for all time.
My life has been an open book. I have no secrets and I encourage no secrets.
I am but a poor struggling soul yearning to be wholly good-wholly truthful and wholly non-violent in thought, word and deed, but ever failing to reach the ideal which I know to be true. I admit it is a painful climb, but the pain of it is a positive pleasure for me. Each step upward makes me feel stronger and fit for the next.
When I think of my littleness and my limitations on the one hand and of the expectations raised about me on the other, I become dazed for the moment, but I come to myself as soon as I realize that these expectations are a tribute not to me, a curious mixture of Jekyll and Hyde, but to the incarnation, however imperfect but comparatively great in me, of the two priceless qualities of truth and non-violence. I must, therefore, not shirk the responsibility of giving what aid I can to fellow-seekers after truth from the West.
Guidance
I claim to have no infallible guidance or inspiration. So far as my experience goes, the claim to infallibility on the part of a human being would be untenable, seeing that inspiration too can come only to one who is free from the action of opposites, and it will be difficult to judge on a given occasion whether the claim to freedom from pairs of opposites is justified. The claim to infallibility would thus always be a most dangerous claim to make. This, however, does not leave us without any guidance whatsoever. The sum-total of the experience of the world is available to us and would be for all time to come.
Moreover, there are not many fundamental truths, but there is only one fundamental truth, which is Truth itself, otherwise known as Non-violence. Finite human being shall never know in its fullness Truth and love, which is in itself infinite. But we do know enough for our guidance. We shall err, and sometimes grievously, in our application. But man is a self-governing being, and self-government necessarily includes the power as much to commit errors as to set them right as often as they are made.
I deny being a visionary. I do not accept the claim of saintliness. I am of the earth, earthly . . . I am prone to as many weakness as you are. But I have seen the world. I have lived in the world with my eyes open. I have gone through the fieriest ordeals that have fallen to the lot of man. I have gone through this discipline.
Self-sacrifice and Ahimsa
I am asking my countrymen in India to follow no other gospel than the gospel of self-sacrifice, which precedes every battle. Whether you belong to the school of violence or non-violence, you will still have to go through the fire of sacrifice and of discipline.
I want to declare to the world, although I have forfeited the regard of many friends in the West - and I must bow my head low; but even for their friendship or love, I must not suppress the voice of conscience, - the prompting of my inner basic nature today. There is something within me impelling me to cry out my agony. I have known humanity. I have studied something of psychology. Such a man knows exactly what it is. I do not mind how you describe it. That voice within tells me, "You have to stand against the whole world although you may have to stand alone. You have to stare in the face the whole world although the world may look at you with blood-shot eyes. Do not fear. Trust the little voice residing within your heart." It says: "Forsake friends, wife and all; but testify to that for which you have lived and for which you have to die."
No Defeatism
Defeat cannot dishearten me. It can only chasten me . . . . I know that God will guide me. Truth is superior to man's wisdom.
I have never lost my optimism. In seemingly darkest hours hope has burnt bright within me. I cannot kill the hope myself. I must say I cannot give an ocular demonstration to justify the hope. But there is no defeat in me.
I do not want to foresee the future. I am concerned with taking care of the present. God has given me no control over the moment following
Trust
It is true that I have often been let down. Many have deceived me and many have been found wanting. But I do not repent of my association with them. For I know how to non-co-operate, as I know how to co-operate. The most practical, the most dignified way of going on in the world is to take people at their word, when you have no positive reason to the contrary.
I believe in trusting. Trust begets trust. Suspicion is foetid and only stinks. He who trusts has never yet lost in the world.
A breach of promise shakes me to my root, especially when I am in any way connected with the author of the breach. And if it cost my life which, after all, at the age of seventy has no insurance value, I should most willingly give it in order to secure due performance of a sacred and solemn promise.
To my knowledge, throughout my public and private career, I have never broken a promise.104
My Leadership and Non Violence
They say I claim to understand human nature as no one else does. I believe I am certainly right, but if I do not believe in my rightness and my methods, I would be unfit to be at the helm of affairs.
As for my leadership, if I have it, it has not come for any seeking, it is a fruit of faithful service. A man can as little discard such leadership as he can the color of his skin. And since I have become an integral part of the nation, it has to keep me with all my faults and shortcomings, of some of which I am painfully conscious and of many others of which candid critics, thanks be to them, never fail to remind me.
It is a bad carpenter who quarrels with his tools. It is a bad general who blames his men for faulty workmanship. I know I am not a bad general. I have wisdom enough to know my limitations. God will give me strength enough to declare my bankruptcy if such is to be my lot. He will perhaps take me away when I am no longer wanted for the work which I have been permitted to do for nearly half a century. But I do entertain the hope that there is yet work for me to do, that the darkness that seems to have enveloped me will disappear, and that, whether with another battle more brilliant than the Dandi March or without, India will come to her own demonstrably through non-violent means. I am praying for the light that will dispel the darkness. Let those who have a living faith in non-violence join me in the prayer.
My Work
I am content with the doing of the task in front of me. I do not worry about the why and wherefore of things Reason helps us to see that we should not dabble in things we cannot fathom.
My work will be finished if I succeed in carrying conviction to the human family, that every man or woman, however weak in body, is the guardian of his or her self-respect and liberty. This defense avails, though the whole world may be against the individual resister.
It will be time enough to pronounce a verdict upon my work after my eyes are closed and this tabernacle is consigned to the flames.
RELEVANCE OF GANDHI TODAY
Gandhi was in himself a legacy of philosophy. The longer-term impact of the man warrants every comment on him in its own right. If all those individuals and movements that have been influenced by Gandhian ideals were to be listed it would read like a roll-call of the great moralists of the twentieth century, and of its great crusades. The careers of men like Danilo Dolci and Martin Luther King or the numerous civil rights campaigns and peace movements were inspired by the ideal of passive disobedience and non-violence. Gandhi has inspired operas like Philip Glass's 'Satyagraha', and novels, such as R.K.Narayan's 'Waiting for the Mahatma'. Very briefly, the questions raised here will concern only the continuing influence and relevance of Gandhi's ideas to the world and to those two countries with which he was mainly concerned, South Africa and India.
It is often assumed that within India Gandhi suffered the fate of all political saints - he was placed on a pedestal and forgotten. This is untrue. The ideas of Gandhi continued to be debated among Gandhians, his opponents, especially the Indian communists, and the ruling elite, particularly during the Prime Ministership of Jawaharlal Nehru. Vinoba Bhave, Gandhi's heir-apparent, took over the Gandhian constructive movement, giving it a more radical edge through his attempt, in the Bhoodan Movement, to bring about a voluntary redistribution of land to the poorer peasantry, above all, to the landless. He was to be strongly supported by Jayaprkash Narayan, whose socialism took on an increasingly Gandhian complexion, and who began to devise sophisticated programmes for the modernization of Indian villages but still inspired by the Gandhian anarchist vision of decentralisation and self-sufficiency. Narayan, or J.P., as he was familiarly known, exerted enormous moral influence by the 1970s and became the leader of national opposition to Prime Minister Indira Gandhi (Nehru's daughter, no relation of the Mahatma) during the Emergency period of 1975- 77. His leadership does much to explain the astonishing defeat of the Congress Party in the 1979 elections.
The impact of Gandhi's ideas on government policy is striking. Indian manufacture remained subject to Gandhian practice to an extraordinary extent. The hand-loom textile industry in 1968 was producing 45 percent of cloth output. In total, small-scale enterprise continued to produce 40 percent of all output and employ three-quarters of the labour force. One commentator has characterized the successive five-year economic plans as 'a curious amalgam of Stalinist and Ruskinian views'. Attempts to inject Gandhian ideals through the village upliftment programme, or Panchayati Raj, were less successful, but are further proof of Nehru's continuing deference to Gandhi's beliefs. There is even the fascinating possibility, in a quite different sphere of policy, that Nehru was inspired by the satyagraha ideals of non-violence in his response to the Chinese invasion of 1962, and that the confrontation between the poorly armed and clad Indian troops and the Chinese in Aksai Chin was the belated indication of how the Indians would have confronted the Japanese in 1942.Yet the continuing plight of the untouchables and of women in India (one notices in particular the repressive caste communal conflicts in Ahmedabad in 1985 and the Hindu-Muslim communal riots in Ayodhya and the Northern India in 1992) point to the limited success of Gandhi's ideals in terms of social change.
Gandhi's South African legacy introduced two themes in particular: the fate of South African Indians and the debate on whether to pursue a non-violent or violent strategy against apartheid. Gandhian-style resistance to apartheid was part of the wider struggle against colonialism and neo-colonialism. With India being the first colonial society to acquire independence, it was inevitable that Gandhi's method should be keenly studied within the Third World and, as Nehru became increasingly important in international affairs as the moving spirit behind the Non-Aligned Movement, India's example became all the more influential. Nkrumah, for instance, was seemingly to adopt Gandhian methods in leading the Gold-Coast (Ghana) to independence by 1957. Gandhi was a world historical figure. It has not been enough to assess him by his own standards and ambitions; he has become a part of twentieth century history and his impact has to be measured as much by the consequences of his actions as by his intentions. This short study of Gandhi has stressed a historically contextual rather than a biographical approach. Gandhi has been seen through the eyes of his contemporaries, as someone caught up in the ebb and flow of events, sometimes taking a central role, sometimes on the periphery. It is an approach that, while emphasising Gandhi's role as a catalyst to events, has also drawn attention to the shortcomings of his actions, to the way they deflected or even disregarded alternative solutions to problems.
Breaking the Shackles : Gandhi's Views on Women
Usha Thakkar
Gandhi worked not only for the political emancipation of the nation, but for liberation of all the suppressed and oppressed sections of society. One of the noteworthy results of his life-work has been the awakening of women, which made them shed their deep-rooted sense of inferiority and rise to dignity and self- esteem. For Gandhi, "When woman, whom we all call abala becomes sabala, all those who are helpless will become powerful". The welfare of the weaker sections of society was dear to his heart. He had no qualms about the priority of social over political ends. In his opinion, to postpone social reform till after the attainment of Swaraj} was not to know the meaning of Swaraj.
Women, urban and rural, educated and uneducated, Indian and foreign, were attracted to his ideas and deeds. While some like Sarojini Naidu, Lakshmi Menon, Sushila Nayyar and Rajkumari Amrit Kaur rose to prominence, there were thousands of unsung and unnoticed heroines of India who learnt the meaning of liberation from him and contributed with all their energy to the struggle for independence. Life sketches and reminiscences of women freedom-fighters give us glimpses of their crusade against injustice and inequality.
An attempt is made in the present paper to understand Gandhi's views on women in the context of social, economic and political issues.
Social Regeneration
Gandhi respected traditions of the society, but not at the cost of loss of individual dignity. His practical and dynamic advice was "It is good to swim in the waters of tradition, but to sink in them is suicide". He never hesitated to criticize the evils which had gripped the Indian society, and tried to mobilize public opinion against such evils. He realised that there were deep-rooted customs hampering the development of women, and women's freedom from such shackles was necessary for the emancipation of the nation.
According to Gandhi, the custom of child-marriage is both a moral as well as a physical evil, for it undermines our morals and induces physical degeneration. The purdah system, according to him, was "vicious, brutal and barbarous". He questioned the basis of the practice of pushing women in seclusion: "Why is there all this morbid anxiety about female purity? Have women any say in the matter of male purity? We hear nothing of women's anxiety about men's chastity. Why should men arrogate to themselves the right to regulate female purity? It cannot be superimposed from without. It is a matter of evolution from within and, therefore, of individual self-effort.4 He called prostitution "moral leprosy" and despised the fact that" the beast in man has made the detestable crime a lucrative profession". He appealed to prostitutes to give up their "unworthy profession" and become "sanyasinis" of India.
Gandhi viewed marriage as a sacrament imposing discipline on both the partners, not a license for physical union and emphasized spiritual union in marriage. He insisted on monogamous marriages and put forward a plea for inter communal marriages between caste Hindus and Harijans. In his opinion, "Woman is the companion of man, gifted with equal mental capacities. She has the right to participate in the very minutest details in the activities of man and she has an equal right of freedom and liberty with him. She is entitled to a supreme place in her own sphere of activity as man is in his". Gandhi was clear that "Woman must cease to consider herself the object of man's lust. The remedy is more in her hands than man's. She must refuse to adorn herself for men including her husband, if she will be an equal partner with man". When Gandhi was asked whether a wife could go against the will of her husband to take up national service, he supported the claim of a wife to devote herself to a noble purpose. He cited the example of Mirabai in support of his argument In his opinion, every wife" has a perfect right to take her own course and meekly brave the consequences when she knows herself to be in the right and when her resistance is for a nobler purpose".9 According to him, the only honourable terms in marriage are mutual love and mutual consent.
For him, sexuality ought to be kept at the minimum inside marriage and totally eliminated outside it. The method of birth-control, he favoured, was by exercising self-restraint in life and restricting physical union only for getting children. Referring to his own life, he observed that he began to enjoy his married life only after he abandoned sex. For him, "the conquest of lust is the highest endeavour of a man's or a woman's existence whereas physical union for the sake of carnal satisfaction is reversion to animality which has to be avoided by both."
Gandhi realised the miseries of widowhood for a woman as "men have ordained perpetual widowhood for women and conferred on themselves the right to fix marriage with another partner on cremation-ground itself". For him, "Voluntary widowhood consciously adopted by a woman who has felt the affection of the partner, adds grace and dignity to life, sanctifies the home and uplifts religion itself. Widowhood imposed by religion or custom is an unbearable loke and defiles the home by secret vice and degrades religion. He believed that it is better for a widow to remarry openly rather than commit sin secretly.
Gandhi sees these widows as a strong reservoir of energy, which could be put to use to bring light to the dark comers of the nation. In his opinion, "It is worth considering carefully in what way the country can avail itself of the services of hundreds of widows, young and old". As Gandhi respected widows who dedicated themselves to the service of humanity, he had great regard for women who chose the path of staying single to serve society and the nation. In his opinion, not every Indian girl is born to marry. There are many girls willing to dedicate themselves to service instead of servicing one man.
Gandhi had visualized a great role for women in eradicating the evil of communalism. His appeal to women was to refuse to cook, and to starve themselves in protest so long as their men "do not wash their hand of these dirty communal squabbles". Gandhi's appeal reached women everywhere in India. He expected great things from them in the areas of work concerning purity of life, removal of untouchability, propagation of Khadi. communal harmony and Swadeshi. His logic was simple: "If Kaikeyi could obtain all that she wanted from Dashrath by dint of Duragraha, what could they not achieve with the help of Satyagraha? ".
Gandhi's own experience of Kasturba's resistance to acceptance of untouchables as members of the family perhaps made him aware of the role that women can play in the removal of untouchability. "If the Hindu heart is to be cured of the taint of untouchability, women must do the lion's share of the work". His appeal to women was "If you consider Harijans untouchables because they perform sanitary service, what mother has not performed such service for her children."
When Gandhi told women that the economic and the moral salvation of India rested mainly with them, he was not paying mere lip-service to them. He was evoking a creative and constructive spirit that was suppressed in them. A simple factor like their choice of clothes and jewellery was transformed by Gandhi into a force for Swadeshi. Khadi came to be identified with opposition against foreign rule and love for the nation, and giving away her jewellery means that a woman is shedding her own shackles.
Political Emancipation
Gandhi revolutionised not only Indian politics, but also the whole perception of life for women. In his words, "My contribution to the great problem (of women's role in society) lies in my presenting for acceptance of truth and ahimsa in every walk of life, whether for individuals or nations. I have hugged the hope that in this, woman will be the unquestioned leader and, having thus found her place in human evolution, will shed her inferiority complex. Women's entry into national politics through non-violent methods brought miraculous results. On the one hand, women became aware of their inner strength, and on the other, the process brought human and moral elements into politics.
Gandhi had tremendous faith in women's inherent capacity for non-violence. And his experience of participation by women in politics from his days in South Africa till the end of his life bears testimony to the fact that they never failed his expectations. With Gandhi's inspiration, they took the struggle right into their homes and raised it to a moral level. Women organized public meetings, sold Khadi and prescribed literature, started picketing shops of liquor and foreign goods, prepared contraband salt, and came forward to face all sorts of atrocities, including inhuman treatment by police officers and imprisonment. They came forward to give all that they had - their wealth and strength, their jewellery and belongings, their skills and labour-all with sacrifices for this unusual and unprecedented struggle.
Gandhi's call to women to involve themselves in the freedom struggle had far-reaching results in changing their outlook. "The cause of Swaraj swept all taboos and old customs before it". Many women in their individual lives shed their age-old prejudices against the caste system. They had no hesitation in leaving the boundaries of their protected homes and going to the jail. They even broke their glass bangles (a sign of ill omen for married women) when they were told that they were made of Czechoslovakian glass. Women's participation in the freedom struggle feminized nationalism and the nationalist struggle helped them to liberate from age-old traditions.
Though Gandhi never challenged the traditional set up, he inspired women to carve out their own destinies within it, and thereby changing its very essence. Women learnt from Gandhi that one can be strong, even if seemingly weak, to protest against injustice. They realised that they do not have to accept the norms of male-dominated politics. They evolved their own perspectives and formulated their own methods. In a way they presented a critique of the colonial unethical state.
Gandhi could see woman as connected with service and not with power. When a woman wrote to him in 1946 about the political scene and the paucity of women in it, he wrote: "So long as considerations of caste and community continue to weigh with us and rule our choice, women will be well-advised to remain aloof and thereby build up their prestige Women workers should enroll women as voters, impart or have imparted to them practical education, teach them to think independently, release them from the chains of caste that bind them so as to bring about a change in them which will compel men to realise women's strength and capacity for sacrifice and give her places of honour. If they will do this, they will purify the present unclear atmosphere." His advice to women was to teach people in villages simple lessons of hygiene and sanitation. Seeking power would be, for them, "reversion of barbarity". And still Gandhi believed that, "Women must have votes and an equal status. But the problem does not end there. It only commences at the point where women begin to affect the political deliberations of the nation."
Economic Self-reliance
Gandhi visualized a humane society, free from exploitation and in justice, built by responsible men and women. Gandhi, however, maintained that the spheres of work for woman and man were different. "She is passive, he is active. She is essentially mistress of the house. He is the breadwinner. She is the keeper and distributor of the bread. She is the caretaker in every sense of the term." Gandhi was of the firm opinion that if women have to work outside the home, they should do so without disturbing it. They can take up some work, which would supplement the income of the family, and spinning, according to him, was perhaps the best work they could undertake. Spinning and weaving for women were "the first lesson in the school of industry". The spinning wheel can be the "widow's loving companion", of livelihood for the poor family and a means to supplement the income of the family of -Pie middle class, and for the well-to-do women, it would be a means to relate their lives to those country s poor women.
Though women had no direct control over economic matters, they were the managers of homes. Gandhi was quick to grasp this fact. So, to popularize the message of Swadeshi, a cardinal economic principle for him, he demanded the support of women. In his opinion, the Swadeshi vow cannot be kept without the help of women. "Men alone will be able to do nothing in the matter. They have no control over the children, that is the woman's sphere. To look after children, to dress them, is the mother's duty and, therefore, it is necessary that women should be fired with the spirit of Swadeshi.
Ideal Models
Gandhi often presented ideals before women, drawn from Indian traditions, mythology and history. He often talked about Sita, Draupadi, Damayanti and Mirabai as great women. There is nothing new for a social reformer drawing inspiration from the tradition. What is new here is the fact that this innovate interpretation of these characters gives a glimpse of the dynamic element in his thinking. He did not accept the negative elements of the Hindu tradition. He visualized the Indian women as new Sitas, Draupadis and Damayantis, "pure, firm and self- controlled".
For Gandhi, Sita was not a weak and dependent creature, but a strong woman conveying the message of Swadeshi, who only wore "cloth made in India" and thus kept her heart and body pure. Moreover, she should defy the might of Ravana by sheer moral courage and she would not waste "a single moment on pleasing Rama by physical channs". Implying thereby that a woman could assert herself in doing what she considered right even if the husband thought otherwise. Another ideal model presented by Gandhi was Draupadi who was not dependent on men and saved herself by an appeal to Krishna when the Pandavas failed to protect her. Here the appeal to Krishna is to be understood as following one's own conscience. He saw Mirabai, as a symbol of courage, who followed her chosen path by defying the social norms of the time.
It is interesting to note that Gandhi does not advise a woman to be an ideal wife or ideal mother. Deviating from the traditional framework, he advises women to be sisters. Pointing out the greatness of a sister over a wife, he maintained that a sister is to all the world, while a wife hands herself over to one man. Moreover, it is possible to become the world's sister only by making Brahmacharya "a natural condition" and being 'fired by the spirit of service". Women have the potential to do immense service to the unfortunate, by doing this they can be "Sisters of Mercy".
Though Gandhi gave the traditional role a new vigour, he had undaunted faith in the chastity and purity of woman. He was sure that the "dazzling purity" of a woman could disarm even the most beastly of men. In his opinion, an ideal woman would rather give up her life than her purity. Construction of the woman in such terms seems to be at times too idealistic in contemporary times. According to Madhu Kishwar, "Gandhi's very vocabulary, in its exaggerated idealization of women as 'sisters of mercy' and 'mothers of entire humanity' reveals the bias of a benevolent patriarch."
And yet, there is something in his ideas that is essentially radical. He did not see women as helpless objects of reform. Neither did he think of bringing change only in some spheres of life, such as marriage or education. His vision of change was comprehensive. He connected the moral with the political, the social and the economic, presenting an eclectic view of life. For him the means had to be identified with the ends; similarly, he did not differentiate between the private and the public worlds of women. He also enhanced the dignity of woman's housework, advising his men followers to take to spinning and to do ordinary works in everyday life. He himself imbibed so many of a woman's qualities, that he became 'mother' to many.
Gandhi saw that the low status of women was the result of prejudices arid adverse traditions, which were centuries old. It was difficult to get women interested in the larger problems of life and society because they knew nothing of them, having never been allowed to breathe the fresh air of freedom. The only factor that would enable women to come out of this situation was the determination and strength of the women themselves. Though men should help in the cause of women, ultimately women will have to determine their destinies. Gandhi sympathizes with women, but he does not want to pity them all the time. Neither does he want them to be irresponsible, pleasure-loving beings.
In Gandhi's philosophy, the women of India found a new identity. His words and deeds have inspired thousands of women, and will continue to do so, in their struggle against injustice and inequality.
Economics, Ethics
I must confess that I do not draw a sharp or any distinction between economics and ethics. Economics that hurt the moral well-being of an individual or a nation are immoral and, therefore, sinful. Thus the economics that permit one country to prey upon another are immoral. It is sinful to buy and use articles made by sweated labour. ( Young India,13-10-1921, p. 325)
The economics that disregard moral and sentimental considerations are like wax works that, being life-like, still lack the life of the living flesh. At every crucial moment thus anew-fangled economic laws have broken down in practice. And nations or individuals who accept them as guiding maxims must perish. ( Young India, 27-10-1921, p. 344)
That economics is untrue which ignores or disregards moral values. The extension of the law of non-violence in the domain of economics means nothing less than the introduction of moral values as a factor to be considered in regulating international commerce.( Young India, 26-10-1924, p. 421)
Ideal Economy
According to me the economic constitution of India and, for the matter of that, the world should be such that no one under should suffer from want of food and clothing. In other words, everybody should be able to get sufficient work to enable him to make the two ends meet.
And this ideal can universally realized only if the means of production of the elementary necessaries of life remain in the control of the masses. These should be freely available to all as God’s air and water are or ought to be; they should not be made vehicle of traffic for the exploitation of others. This monopolization by any country, nation or group of persons would be unjust. The neglect of this simple principle is the cause of destitution that we witness today not only in this unhappy land but other parts of the world too.( Young India,15-11-1928, p381)
True economics never militates against the highest ethical standard, just as all true ethics to be worth its name must at the same time be also good economics. An economics that inculcates Mammon worship, and enables the strong to amass wealth at the expense of the weak, is a false and dismal science. It spells death. True economics, on the other hand, stands for social justice, it promotes the good of all equally including the weakest, and is indispensable for decent life.( Harijan, 9-10-1937, p.292)
If we will but cleanse our houses, our palaces and temples of the attributes of wealth and show in them the attributes of morality, we can offer battle to any combinations of hostile forces without having to carry the burden of a heavy militia. Let us seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, and the irreovocable promise is that everything will be added unto us. These are real economics. May you and I treasure them and enforce them in our life! (Speeches and Writings of Mahatma Gandhi, p. 355)
Minimum Violence
Strictly speaking, no activity and no industry is possible without a certain amount of violence, no matter how little. Even the very process of living is impossible without a certain amount of violence. What we have to do is to minimize it to the greatest extent possible. Indeed the very word non-violence, a negative word, means that it is an effort to abandon the violence that is inevitable in life. Therefore, whoever believes in ahimsa will engage himself in occupations that involve the least possible violence.
Thus, for instance, one cannot conceive of a man believing in non-violence carrying on the occupation of a butcher. Not that a meat-eater cannot be non-violent but even a meat-eater believing in non-violence will not go in for shikar, and he will not engage in war or war preparations. Thus there are many activities and occupations which necessarily involve violence and must be eschewed by a non-violent man.
But there is agriculture without which life is impossible, and which does involve a certain amount of violence. The determining factor therefore is the occupation founded on violence? But since all activity involves some measure of violence, all we have to do is to minimize the violence involved in it. This is not possible without a heart-belief in non-violence.
Suppose there is a man who does no actual violence, who labours for his bread, but who is always consumed with envy at other people’s wealth or prosperity. He is not non-violent. A non-violent occupation is thus that occupation, which is fundamentally free from violence and which, involves no exploitation or envy of others.
Rural Economics
Now I have no historical proof, but I believe that there was a time in India when village economics were organized on the basis of such non-violent occupations, not on the basis of rights of man but on the duties of man. Those who engaged themselves in such occupations did earn their living, but their labour contributed to the good of the community.
Body labour was at the core of these occupations and industries, and there was no large-scale machinery. For when a man is content to own only so much land as he can till with his own labour, he cannot exploit others. Handicrafts exclude exploitation and slavery.
Gandhi's Views On Economics
Excerpts from 'The Great Sentinel'
It was our love of foreign cloth that ousted the wheel from its position of dignity. Therefore I consider it a sin to wear foreign cloth.
I must confess that I do not draw a sharp or any distinction between economics and ethics. Economics that hurt the moral well-being of an individual or a nation are immoral and therefore sinful. Thus the economics that permit one country to prey upon another are immoral. It is sinful to buy and use articles made by sweated labour. It is sinful to eat American wheat and let my neighbour the grain-dealer starve for want of custom. Similarly it is sinful for me to wear the latest finery of Regent Street, when I know that if I had but worn the things woven by the neighbouring spinners and weavers, that would have clothed me, and fed and clothed them. On the knowledge of my sin bursting upon me, I must consign the foreign garments to the flames and thus purify myself, and thenceforth rest content with the rough khadi made by my neighbours. On knowing that my neighbours may not, having given up the occupation, take kindly to the spinning-wheel, I must take it up myself and thus make it popular.
- Young India, 13-10-1921
I would say that if the village perishes India will perish too. India will be no more India. Her own mission in the world will get lost. The revival of the village is possible only when it is no more exploited. Industrialization on a mass scale will necessarily lead to passive or active exploitation of the villagers as the problems of competition and marketing come in. Therefore we have to concentrate on the village being self-contained, manufacturing mainly for use. Provided this character of the village industry is maintained, there would be no objection to villagers using even the modern machines and tools that they can make and can afford to use. Only they should not be used as a means of exploitation of others.
THE REAL India lies in the 7,00,000 villages. If Indian civilization is to make its full contribution to the building up of a stable world order, it is this vast mass of humanity that has.to be made to live again.
We have to tackle the triple malady which holds our villages fast in its grip : (I) want of corporate sanitation ; (ii) deficient diet; (iii) inertia . . . They [villagers] are not interested in their own welfare. They don't appreciate modern sanitary methods. They don't want to exert themselves beyond scratching their farms or doing such labour as they are used to. These difficulties are real and serious. But they must not baffle us
We must have an unquenchable faith in our mission. We must be patient with the people. We are ourselves novices in village work. We have to deal with a chronic disease. Patience and perseverance, if we have them, overcome mountains of difficulties. We are like nurses who may not leave their patients because they are reported to have an incurable disease.
Villages have suffered long from neglect by those who have had the benefit of education. They have chosen the city life. The village movement is an attempt to establish healthy contact with the villages by inducing those who are fired with the spirit of service to settle in them and find self-expression in the service of villagers.
Those who have settled in villages in the spirit of service are not dismayed by the difficulties facing them. They knew before they went that they would have to contend against many difficulties, including even sullenness on the part of villagers. Only those, therefore, who have faith in themselves and in their mission will serve the villagers and influence their lives.
Workers
A true life lived amongst the people is in itself an object lesson that must produce its own effect upon immediate surroundings. The difficulty with the young is, perhaps, that he has gone to the village merely to earn a living without the spirit of service behind it.
I admit that village life does not offer attractions to those who go there in search of money. Without the incentive of service village life would jar after the novelty has worn out. No young man having gone to a village may abandon the pursuit on the slightest contact with difficulty. Patient effort will show that villagers are not very different from city-dwellers and that they will respond to kindness and attention.
It is no doubt true that one does not have in the villages the opportunity of contact with the great ones of the land. With the growth of village mentality the leaders will find it necessary to tour in the villages and establish a living touch with them. Moreover, the companionship of the great and the good is available to all through the works of saints like Chaitanya, Ramakrishna, Tulsidas, Kabir, Nanak, Dadu, Tukaram, Tiruvalluvar, and others too numerous to mention, though equally known and pious.
Literature
The difficulty is to get the mind tuned to the reception of permanent values. If it is modern thought-political, social, economic, scientific-that is meant, it is possible to procure literature that will satisfy curiosity. I admit, however, that one does not find such as easily as one finds religious literature. Saints wrote and spoke for the masses. The vogue for translating modern thought to the masses in an acceptable manner has not yet quite set in. but it must come in time.
I would, therefore, advise young men. Not to give in, but persist in their effort and by their presence make the villages more livable and lovable. That they will do by serving the villages in a manner acceptable to the villagers. Everyone can make a beginning by making the villages cleaner by their own labour and removing illiteracy to the extent of their ability. And if their lives are clean, methodical and industrious, there is no doubt that the infection will spread in the villages in which they may be working.
Samagra Gramaseva
A Samagra Gramaseva must know everybody living in the village and render them such service as he can. That does not mean that the worker will be able to do everything single-handed. He will show them the way of helping themselves and procure for them such help and materials as they require. He will train up his own helpers. He will so win over the villagers that they will seek and follow his advice.
Supposing I go and settle down in a village with a GHANI (village oil press), I won't be an ordinary GHANCHI (oil presser) earning 15-20 rupees a month. I will be a Mahatma GHANCHI. I will be a Mahatma GHANCHI. I have used the word 'Mahatma' in fun , but what I mean to say is that as a GHANCHI I will become a model for the villagers to follow. I will be a GHANCHI who knows the Gita and the Quran. I will be learned enough to teach their children. I may not be able to do so for lack of time. The villagers will come to me and ask me: "Please make arrangements for our children's education". I will tell them: "I can find you a teacher, but you will have to bear the expenses". And they will be prepared to do so most willingly.
I will teach them spinning and when they come and ask me for the services of a weaver, I will find them a weaver on the same terms as I found them a teacher. And the weaver will teach them how to weave their own cloth. I will inculcate in them the importance of hygiene and sanitation, and when they come and ask me for a sweeper, I will tell them: "I will be your sweeper and I will train you all in the job."
This is my conception of Samagra Gramaseva. You may tell me that I will never find a GHANCHI of this description in this age. Then I will say that we cannot hope to improve our villages in this age. . . . After all, the man who runs an oil mill is a GHANCHI. He has money but his strength does not lie in his money. Real strength lies in knowledge. True knowledge gives a moral standing and moral strength. Everyone seeks the advice of such a man.
Economic Survey
The villages will be surveyed and a list prepared of things that can be manufactured locally with little or no help which may be required for village use or for sale outside, such for instance as GHANI-pressed oil and cakes, burning oil prepared through GHANIS, hand-pounded rice, TADGUD, honey, toys, mats, hand-made paper, village soap, etc. if enough care is thus taken, the villages, most of them as good as dead or dying, will hum with life and exhibit the immense possibilities they have of supplying most of their wants themselves and of the cities and towns of India.
Arts And Crafts
The villagers should develop such a high degree of skill that articles prepared by them should command a ready market outside. When our villages are fully developed, there will be no dearth in them of men with a high degree of skill and artistic talent. There will be village poets, village artists, village architects, linguists and research workers. In shout, there will be nothing in life worth having which will not be had in the villages.
Today the villages are dung heaps. Tomorrow they will be like tiny gardens of Eden where dwell highly intelligent folk whom no one can deceive or exploit. The reconstruction of the villages along these lines should begin right now. The reconstruction of the villages should not be organized on a temporary but permanent basis.
Economic Reorganization
In my writing on cent per cent Swadeshi. I have shown how some aspects of it can be tackled immediately with benefit to the starving millions both economically and hygienically. The richest in the land can share the benefit. Thus, if rice can be pounded in the villages after the old fashion, the wages will fill the pockets of the rice-pounding sisters and the rice-eating millions will get some sustenance from the unpolished rice instead of pure starch which the polished rice provides.
Human greed, which takes no account of the health or the wealth of the people who come under its heels, is responsible for the hideous rice-mills one sees in all the rice-producing tracts. If public opinion was strong, it will make rice-mills an impossibility by simply insisting on unpolished rice and appealing to the owner of rice-mills to stop a traffic that undermines the health of a whole nation and robs the poor of an honest means of livelihood.
...I would say that, if the village perishes, India will perish too. India will be no more India. Her own mission in the world will get lost. The revival of the village is possible only when it is no more exploited. Industrialization on a mass scale will necessarily lead to passive or active exploitation of the villagers as the problems of competition and marketing come in.
Therefore, we have to concentrate on the village being self-contained, manufacturing mainly for use. Provided this character of the village industry is maintained, there would be no objection to villagers using even the modern machines and tools that they can make and can afford to use. Only, they should not be used as a means of exploitation of others.
Nonviolent Economy
You cannot build nonviolence on a factory civilization, but it can be built on self-contained villages... Rural economy as I have conceived it, eschews exploitation altogether, and exploitation is the essence of violence. You have, therefore, to be rural-minded before you can be non-violent, and to be rural-minded you have to have faith in the spinning wheel.
We have to make a choice between India of the villages that are as ancient as herself and India of the cities which are a creation of foreign domination. Today the cities dominate and drain the villages so that they are crumbling to ruin. My Khadi mentality tells me that cities must subserve villages when that domination goes. Exploiting of villages is itself organized violence. If we want Swaraj to be built on nonviolence, we will have to give the villages their proper place.
Food Reform
Since the economic reorganization of the villages has been commenced with food reform, it is necessary to find out the simplest and cheapest foods that would enable the villagers to regain the lost health. The addition of green leaves to their meals will enable the villagers to avoid many diseases from which they are now suffering.
The villagers' food is deficient in vitamins; many of them can be supplied by fresh green leaves. An eminent doctor told me a proper use of green leaves is calculated to revolutionize the customary notions of food and much of what was today being supplied by mild may be supplied by green leaves.261
Power Machinery
If we could have electricity in every village home, I should not mind villagers plying their implements and tools, with the help of electricity. But then the village communities or the State would own power-houses just as they have their grazing pastures. But where there is no electricity and no machinery, what are idle hands to do.
I regard the existence of power wheels for the grinding of corn in thousands of villages as the limit of our helplessness. I suppose India does not produce all the engines or grinding machines..... The planting of such machinery and engines on a large scale in villages is also a sign of greed. Is it proper to fill one's pocket in this manner at the expense of the poor? Every such machinery puts thousands of hand-CHAKKIS out of work and takes away employment from thousand of housewives and artisans who make these CHAKKIS.
Moreover, the process is infective and will spread to every village industry. The decay of the latter spells too the decay of art. If it meant replacement of old crafts by new ones, one might not have much to say against it. But this is not what is happening. In the thousands of villages where power machinery exists, one misses the sweet music, in the early morning, of the grinders at work.
MOHANDAS KARAMCHAND GANDHI
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Gandhian Philosophy in Short: By Mahatma Himself
I know the path. It is straight and narrow. It is like the edge of a sword. I rejoice to walk on it. I weep when I slip. God's word is: 'He who strives never perishes.' I have implicit faith in that promise. Though, therefore, from my weakness I fail a thousand times, I will not lose faith, but hope that I shall see the Light when the flesh has been brought under perfect subjection, as some day it must.
My soul refuses to be satisfied so long as it is a helpless witness of a single wrong or a single misery. But it is not possible for me, a weak, frail, miserable being, to mend every wrong or to hold myself free of blame for all the wrong I see.
The spirit in me pulls one way, the flesh in me pulls in the opposite direction. There is freedom from the action of these two forces, but that freedom is attainable only by slow and painful stages.
I cannot attain freedom by a mechanical refusal to act, but only by intelligent action in a detached manner. This struggle resolves itself into an incessant crucifixion of the flesh so that the spirit may become entirely free.
Search for Truth
I am but a seeker after Truth. I claim to have found a way to it. I claim to be making a ceaseless effort to find it. But I admit that I have not yet found it. To find Truth completely is to realize oneself and one's destiny, i.e., to become perfect. I am painfully conscious of my imperfections, and therein lies all the strength I posses, because it is a rare thing for a man to know his own limitations.
If I was a perfect man, I own I should not feel the miseries of neighbors as I do. As a perfect man I should take note of them, prescribe a remedy, and compel adoption by the force of unchangeable Truth in me. But as yet I only see as through a glass darkly and, therefore, have to carry conviction by slow and laborious processes, and then, too, not always with success.
That being so, I would be less than human if, with all my knowledge of avoidable misery pervading the land and of the sight of mere skeletons under the very shadow of the Lord of the Universe, I did not feel with and for all the suffering but dumb millions of India.86
Trust in God
I am in the world feeling my way to light 'amid the encircling gloom'. I often err and miscalculate My trust is solely in God. And I trust men only because I trust God. If I had no God to rely upon, I should be like Timon, a hater of my species.
I will not be a traitor to God to please the whole world.
Whatever striking things I have done in life, I have not done prompted by reason but prompted by instinct, I would say, God.
I am a man of faith. My reliance is solely on God. One step is enough for me. The next step He will make clear to me when the time for it comes.
No Secrecy
I have no secret methods. I know no diplomacy save that of truth. I have no weapon but non-violence. I may be unconsciously led astray for a while, but not for all time.
My life has been an open book. I have no secrets and I encourage no secrets.
I am but a poor struggling soul yearning to be wholly good-wholly truthful and wholly non-violent in thought, word and deed, but ever failing to reach the ideal which I know to be true. I admit it is a painful climb, but the pain of it is a positive pleasure for me. Each step upward makes me feel stronger and fit for the next.
When I think of my littleness and my limitations on the one hand and of the expectations raised about me on the other, I become dazed for the moment, but I come to myself as soon as I realize that these expectations are a tribute not to me, a curious mixture of Jekyll and Hyde, but to the incarnation, however imperfect but comparatively great in me, of the two priceless qualities of truth and non-violence. I must, therefore, not shirk the responsibility of giving what aid I can to fellow-seekers after truth from the West.
Guidance
I claim to have no infallible guidance or inspiration. So far as my experience goes, the claim to infallibility on the part of a human being would be untenable, seeing that inspiration too can come only to one who is free from the action of opposites, and it will be difficult to judge on a given occasion whether the claim to freedom from pairs of opposites is justified. The claim to infallibility would thus always be a most dangerous claim to make. This, however, does not leave us without any guidance whatsoever. The sum-total of the experience of the world is available to us and would be for all time to come.
Moreover, there are not many fundamental truths, but there is only one fundamental truth, which is Truth itself, otherwise known as Non-violence. Finite human being shall never know in its fullness Truth and love, which is in itself infinite. But we do know enough for our guidance. We shall err, and sometimes grievously, in our application. But man is a self-governing being, and self-government necessarily includes the power as much to commit errors as to set them right as often as they are made.
I deny being a visionary. I do not accept the claim of saintliness. I am of the earth, earthly . . . I am prone to as many weakness as you are. But I have seen the world. I have lived in the world with my eyes open. I have gone through the fieriest ordeals that have fallen to the lot of man. I have gone through this discipline.
Self-sacrifice and Ahimsa
I am asking my countrymen in India to follow no other gospel than the gospel of self-sacrifice, which precedes every battle. Whether you belong to the school of violence or non-violence, you will still have to go through the fire of sacrifice and of discipline.
I want to declare to the world, although I have forfeited the regard of many friends in the West - and I must bow my head low; but even for their friendship or love, I must not suppress the voice of conscience, - the prompting of my inner basic nature today. There is something within me impelling me to cry out my agony. I have known humanity. I have studied something of psychology. Such a man knows exactly what it is. I do not mind how you describe it. That voice within tells me, "You have to stand against the whole world although you may have to stand alone. You have to stare in the face the whole world although the world may look at you with blood-shot eyes. Do not fear. Trust the little voice residing within your heart." It says: "Forsake friends, wife and all; but testify to that for which you have lived and for which you have to die."
No Defeatism
Defeat cannot dishearten me. It can only chasten me . . . . I know that God will guide me. Truth is superior to man's wisdom.
I have never lost my optimism. In seemingly darkest hours hope has burnt bright within me. I cannot kill the hope myself. I must say I cannot give an ocular demonstration to justify the hope. But there is no defeat in me.
I do not want to foresee the future. I am concerned with taking care of the present. God has given me no control over the moment following
Trust
It is true that I have often been let down. Many have deceived me and many have been found wanting. But I do not repent of my association with them. For I know how to non-co-operate, as I know how to co-operate. The most practical, the most dignified way of going on in the world is to take people at their word, when you have no positive reason to the contrary.
I believe in trusting. Trust begets trust. Suspicion is foetid and only stinks. He who trusts has never yet lost in the world.
A breach of promise shakes me to my root, especially when I am in any way connected with the author of the breach. And if it cost my life which, after all, at the age of seventy has no insurance value, I should most willingly give it in order to secure due performance of a sacred and solemn promise.
To my knowledge, throughout my public and private career, I have never broken a promise.104
My Leadership and Non Violence
They say I claim to understand human nature as no one else does. I believe I am certainly right, but if I do not believe in my rightness and my methods, I would be unfit to be at the helm of affairs.
As for my leadership, if I have it, it has not come for any seeking, it is a fruit of faithful service. A man can as little discard such leadership as he can the color of his skin. And since I have become an integral part of the nation, it has to keep me with all my faults and shortcomings, of some of which I am painfully conscious and of many others of which candid critics, thanks be to them, never fail to remind me.
It is a bad carpenter who quarrels with his tools. It is a bad general who blames his men for faulty workmanship. I know I am not a bad general. I have wisdom enough to know my limitations. God will give me strength enough to declare my bankruptcy if such is to be my lot. He will perhaps take me away when I am no longer wanted for the work which I have been permitted to do for nearly half a century. But I do entertain the hope that there is yet work for me to do, that the darkness that seems to have enveloped me will disappear, and that, whether with another battle more brilliant than the Dandi March or without, India will come to her own demonstrably through non-violent means. I am praying for the light that will dispel the darkness. Let those who have a living faith in non-violence join me in the prayer.
My Work
I am content with the doing of the task in front of me. I do not worry about the why and wherefore of things Reason helps us to see that we should not dabble in things we cannot fathom.
My work will be finished if I succeed in carrying conviction to the human family, that every man or woman, however weak in body, is the guardian of his or her self-respect and liberty. This defense avails, though the whole world may be against the individual resister.
It will be time enough to pronounce a verdict upon my work after my eyes are closed and this tabernacle is consigned to the flames.
RELEVANCE OF GANDHI TODAY
Gandhi was in himself a legacy of philosophy. The longer-term impact of the man warrants every comment on him in its own right. If all those individuals and movements that have been influenced by Gandhian ideals were to be listed it would read like a roll-call of the great moralists of the twentieth century, and of its great crusades. The careers of men like Danilo Dolci and Martin Luther King or the numerous civil rights campaigns and peace movements were inspired by the ideal of passive disobedience and non-violence. Gandhi has inspired operas like Philip Glass's 'Satyagraha', and novels, such as R.K.Narayan's 'Waiting for the Mahatma'. Very briefly, the questions raised here will concern only the continuing influence and relevance of Gandhi's ideas to the world and to those two countries with which he was mainly concerned, South Africa and India.
It is often assumed that within India Gandhi suffered the fate of all political saints - he was placed on a pedestal and forgotten. This is untrue. The ideas of Gandhi continued to be debated among Gandhians, his opponents, especially the Indian communists, and the ruling elite, particularly during the Prime Ministership of Jawaharlal Nehru. Vinoba Bhave, Gandhi's heir-apparent, took over the Gandhian constructive movement, giving it a more radical edge through his attempt, in the Bhoodan Movement, to bring about a voluntary redistribution of land to the poorer peasantry, above all, to the landless. He was to be strongly supported by Jayaprkash Narayan, whose socialism took on an increasingly Gandhian complexion, and who began to devise sophisticated programmes for the modernization of Indian villages but still inspired by the Gandhian anarchist vision of decentralisation and self-sufficiency. Narayan, or J.P., as he was familiarly known, exerted enormous moral influence by the 1970s and became the leader of national opposition to Prime Minister Indira Gandhi (Nehru's daughter, no relation of the Mahatma) during the Emergency period of 1975- 77. His leadership does much to explain the astonishing defeat of the Congress Party in the 1979 elections.
The impact of Gandhi's ideas on government policy is striking. Indian manufacture remained subject to Gandhian practice to an extraordinary extent. The hand-loom textile industry in 1968 was producing 45 percent of cloth output. In total, small-scale enterprise continued to produce 40 percent of all output and employ three-quarters of the labour force. One commentator has characterized the successive five-year economic plans as 'a curious amalgam of Stalinist and Ruskinian views'. Attempts to inject Gandhian ideals through the village upliftment programme, or Panchayati Raj, were less successful, but are further proof of Nehru's continuing deference to Gandhi's beliefs. There is even the fascinating possibility, in a quite different sphere of policy, that Nehru was inspired by the satyagraha ideals of non-violence in his response to the Chinese invasion of 1962, and that the confrontation between the poorly armed and clad Indian troops and the Chinese in Aksai Chin was the belated indication of how the Indians would have confronted the Japanese in 1942.Yet the continuing plight of the untouchables and of women in India (one notices in particular the repressive caste communal conflicts in Ahmedabad in 1985 and the Hindu-Muslim communal riots in Ayodhya and the Northern India in 1992) point to the limited success of Gandhi's ideals in terms of social change.
Gandhi's South African legacy introduced two themes in particular: the fate of South African Indians and the debate on whether to pursue a non-violent or violent strategy against apartheid. Gandhian-style resistance to apartheid was part of the wider struggle against colonialism and neo-colonialism. With India being the first colonial society to acquire independence, it was inevitable that Gandhi's method should be keenly studied within the Third World and, as Nehru became increasingly important in international affairs as the moving spirit behind the Non-Aligned Movement, India's example became all the more influential. Nkrumah, for instance, was seemingly to adopt Gandhian methods in leading the Gold-Coast (Ghana) to independence by 1957. Gandhi was a world historical figure. It has not been enough to assess him by his own standards and ambitions; he has become a part of twentieth century history and his impact has to be measured as much by the consequences of his actions as by his intentions. This short study of Gandhi has stressed a historically contextual rather than a biographical approach. Gandhi has been seen through the eyes of his contemporaries, as someone caught up in the ebb and flow of events, sometimes taking a central role, sometimes on the periphery. It is an approach that, while emphasising Gandhi's role as a catalyst to events, has also drawn attention to the shortcomings of his actions, to the way they deflected or even disregarded alternative solutions to problems.
Breaking the Shackles : Gandhi's Views on Women
Usha Thakkar
Gandhi worked not only for the political emancipation of the nation, but for liberation of all the suppressed and oppressed sections of society. One of the noteworthy results of his life-work has been the awakening of women, which made them shed their deep-rooted sense of inferiority and rise to dignity and self- esteem. For Gandhi, "When woman, whom we all call abala becomes sabala, all those who are helpless will become powerful". The welfare of the weaker sections of society was dear to his heart. He had no qualms about the priority of social over political ends. In his opinion, to postpone social reform till after the attainment of Swaraj} was not to know the meaning of Swaraj.
Women, urban and rural, educated and uneducated, Indian and foreign, were attracted to his ideas and deeds. While some like Sarojini Naidu, Lakshmi Menon, Sushila Nayyar and Rajkumari Amrit Kaur rose to prominence, there were thousands of unsung and unnoticed heroines of India who learnt the meaning of liberation from him and contributed with all their energy to the struggle for independence. Life sketches and reminiscences of women freedom-fighters give us glimpses of their crusade against injustice and inequality.
An attempt is made in the present paper to understand Gandhi's views on women in the context of social, economic and political issues.
Social Regeneration
Gandhi respected traditions of the society, but not at the cost of loss of individual dignity. His practical and dynamic advice was "It is good to swim in the waters of tradition, but to sink in them is suicide". He never hesitated to criticize the evils which had gripped the Indian society, and tried to mobilize public opinion against such evils. He realised that there were deep-rooted customs hampering the development of women, and women's freedom from such shackles was necessary for the emancipation of the nation.
According to Gandhi, the custom of child-marriage is both a moral as well as a physical evil, for it undermines our morals and induces physical degeneration. The purdah system, according to him, was "vicious, brutal and barbarous". He questioned the basis of the practice of pushing women in seclusion: "Why is there all this morbid anxiety about female purity? Have women any say in the matter of male purity? We hear nothing of women's anxiety about men's chastity. Why should men arrogate to themselves the right to regulate female purity? It cannot be superimposed from without. It is a matter of evolution from within and, therefore, of individual self-effort.4 He called prostitution "moral leprosy" and despised the fact that" the beast in man has made the detestable crime a lucrative profession". He appealed to prostitutes to give up their "unworthy profession" and become "sanyasinis" of India.
Gandhi viewed marriage as a sacrament imposing discipline on both the partners, not a license for physical union and emphasized spiritual union in marriage. He insisted on monogamous marriages and put forward a plea for inter communal marriages between caste Hindus and Harijans. In his opinion, "Woman is the companion of man, gifted with equal mental capacities. She has the right to participate in the very minutest details in the activities of man and she has an equal right of freedom and liberty with him. She is entitled to a supreme place in her own sphere of activity as man is in his". Gandhi was clear that "Woman must cease to consider herself the object of man's lust. The remedy is more in her hands than man's. She must refuse to adorn herself for men including her husband, if she will be an equal partner with man". When Gandhi was asked whether a wife could go against the will of her husband to take up national service, he supported the claim of a wife to devote herself to a noble purpose. He cited the example of Mirabai in support of his argument In his opinion, every wife" has a perfect right to take her own course and meekly brave the consequences when she knows herself to be in the right and when her resistance is for a nobler purpose".9 According to him, the only honourable terms in marriage are mutual love and mutual consent.
For him, sexuality ought to be kept at the minimum inside marriage and totally eliminated outside it. The method of birth-control, he favoured, was by exercising self-restraint in life and restricting physical union only for getting children. Referring to his own life, he observed that he began to enjoy his married life only after he abandoned sex. For him, "the conquest of lust is the highest endeavour of a man's or a woman's existence whereas physical union for the sake of carnal satisfaction is reversion to animality which has to be avoided by both."
Gandhi realised the miseries of widowhood for a woman as "men have ordained perpetual widowhood for women and conferred on themselves the right to fix marriage with another partner on cremation-ground itself". For him, "Voluntary widowhood consciously adopted by a woman who has felt the affection of the partner, adds grace and dignity to life, sanctifies the home and uplifts religion itself. Widowhood imposed by religion or custom is an unbearable loke and defiles the home by secret vice and degrades religion. He believed that it is better for a widow to remarry openly rather than commit sin secretly.
Gandhi sees these widows as a strong reservoir of energy, which could be put to use to bring light to the dark comers of the nation. In his opinion, "It is worth considering carefully in what way the country can avail itself of the services of hundreds of widows, young and old". As Gandhi respected widows who dedicated themselves to the service of humanity, he had great regard for women who chose the path of staying single to serve society and the nation. In his opinion, not every Indian girl is born to marry. There are many girls willing to dedicate themselves to service instead of servicing one man.
Gandhi had visualized a great role for women in eradicating the evil of communalism. His appeal to women was to refuse to cook, and to starve themselves in protest so long as their men "do not wash their hand of these dirty communal squabbles". Gandhi's appeal reached women everywhere in India. He expected great things from them in the areas of work concerning purity of life, removal of untouchability, propagation of Khadi. communal harmony and Swadeshi. His logic was simple: "If Kaikeyi could obtain all that she wanted from Dashrath by dint of Duragraha, what could they not achieve with the help of Satyagraha? ".
Gandhi's own experience of Kasturba's resistance to acceptance of untouchables as members of the family perhaps made him aware of the role that women can play in the removal of untouchability. "If the Hindu heart is to be cured of the taint of untouchability, women must do the lion's share of the work". His appeal to women was "If you consider Harijans untouchables because they perform sanitary service, what mother has not performed such service for her children."
When Gandhi told women that the economic and the moral salvation of India rested mainly with them, he was not paying mere lip-service to them. He was evoking a creative and constructive spirit that was suppressed in them. A simple factor like their choice of clothes and jewellery was transformed by Gandhi into a force for Swadeshi. Khadi came to be identified with opposition against foreign rule and love for the nation, and giving away her jewellery means that a woman is shedding her own shackles.
Political Emancipation
Gandhi revolutionised not only Indian politics, but also the whole perception of life for women. In his words, "My contribution to the great problem (of women's role in society) lies in my presenting for acceptance of truth and ahimsa in every walk of life, whether for individuals or nations. I have hugged the hope that in this, woman will be the unquestioned leader and, having thus found her place in human evolution, will shed her inferiority complex. Women's entry into national politics through non-violent methods brought miraculous results. On the one hand, women became aware of their inner strength, and on the other, the process brought human and moral elements into politics.
Gandhi had tremendous faith in women's inherent capacity for non-violence. And his experience of participation by women in politics from his days in South Africa till the end of his life bears testimony to the fact that they never failed his expectations. With Gandhi's inspiration, they took the struggle right into their homes and raised it to a moral level. Women organized public meetings, sold Khadi and prescribed literature, started picketing shops of liquor and foreign goods, prepared contraband salt, and came forward to face all sorts of atrocities, including inhuman treatment by police officers and imprisonment. They came forward to give all that they had - their wealth and strength, their jewellery and belongings, their skills and labour-all with sacrifices for this unusual and unprecedented struggle.
Gandhi's call to women to involve themselves in the freedom struggle had far-reaching results in changing their outlook. "The cause of Swaraj swept all taboos and old customs before it". Many women in their individual lives shed their age-old prejudices against the caste system. They had no hesitation in leaving the boundaries of their protected homes and going to the jail. They even broke their glass bangles (a sign of ill omen for married women) when they were told that they were made of Czechoslovakian glass. Women's participation in the freedom struggle feminized nationalism and the nationalist struggle helped them to liberate from age-old traditions.
Though Gandhi never challenged the traditional set up, he inspired women to carve out their own destinies within it, and thereby changing its very essence. Women learnt from Gandhi that one can be strong, even if seemingly weak, to protest against injustice. They realised that they do not have to accept the norms of male-dominated politics. They evolved their own perspectives and formulated their own methods. In a way they presented a critique of the colonial unethical state.
Gandhi could see woman as connected with service and not with power. When a woman wrote to him in 1946 about the political scene and the paucity of women in it, he wrote: "So long as considerations of caste and community continue to weigh with us and rule our choice, women will be well-advised to remain aloof and thereby build up their prestige Women workers should enroll women as voters, impart or have imparted to them practical education, teach them to think independently, release them from the chains of caste that bind them so as to bring about a change in them which will compel men to realise women's strength and capacity for sacrifice and give her places of honour. If they will do this, they will purify the present unclear atmosphere." His advice to women was to teach people in villages simple lessons of hygiene and sanitation. Seeking power would be, for them, "reversion of barbarity". And still Gandhi believed that, "Women must have votes and an equal status. But the problem does not end there. It only commences at the point where women begin to affect the political deliberations of the nation."
Economic Self-reliance
Gandhi visualized a humane society, free from exploitation and in justice, built by responsible men and women. Gandhi, however, maintained that the spheres of work for woman and man were different. "She is passive, he is active. She is essentially mistress of the house. He is the breadwinner. She is the keeper and distributor of the bread. She is the caretaker in every sense of the term." Gandhi was of the firm opinion that if women have to work outside the home, they should do so without disturbing it. They can take up some work, which would supplement the income of the family, and spinning, according to him, was perhaps the best work they could undertake. Spinning and weaving for women were "the first lesson in the school of industry". The spinning wheel can be the "widow's loving companion", of livelihood for the poor family and a means to supplement the income of the family of -Pie middle class, and for the well-to-do women, it would be a means to relate their lives to those country s poor women.
Though women had no direct control over economic matters, they were the managers of homes. Gandhi was quick to grasp this fact. So, to popularize the message of Swadeshi, a cardinal economic principle for him, he demanded the support of women. In his opinion, the Swadeshi vow cannot be kept without the help of women. "Men alone will be able to do nothing in the matter. They have no control over the children, that is the woman's sphere. To look after children, to dress them, is the mother's duty and, therefore, it is necessary that women should be fired with the spirit of Swadeshi.
Ideal Models
Gandhi often presented ideals before women, drawn from Indian traditions, mythology and history. He often talked about Sita, Draupadi, Damayanti and Mirabai as great women. There is nothing new for a social reformer drawing inspiration from the tradition. What is new here is the fact that this innovate interpretation of these characters gives a glimpse of the dynamic element in his thinking. He did not accept the negative elements of the Hindu tradition. He visualized the Indian women as new Sitas, Draupadis and Damayantis, "pure, firm and self- controlled".
For Gandhi, Sita was not a weak and dependent creature, but a strong woman conveying the message of Swadeshi, who only wore "cloth made in India" and thus kept her heart and body pure. Moreover, she should defy the might of Ravana by sheer moral courage and she would not waste "a single moment on pleasing Rama by physical channs". Implying thereby that a woman could assert herself in doing what she considered right even if the husband thought otherwise. Another ideal model presented by Gandhi was Draupadi who was not dependent on men and saved herself by an appeal to Krishna when the Pandavas failed to protect her. Here the appeal to Krishna is to be understood as following one's own conscience. He saw Mirabai, as a symbol of courage, who followed her chosen path by defying the social norms of the time.
It is interesting to note that Gandhi does not advise a woman to be an ideal wife or ideal mother. Deviating from the traditional framework, he advises women to be sisters. Pointing out the greatness of a sister over a wife, he maintained that a sister is to all the world, while a wife hands herself over to one man. Moreover, it is possible to become the world's sister only by making Brahmacharya "a natural condition" and being 'fired by the spirit of service". Women have the potential to do immense service to the unfortunate, by doing this they can be "Sisters of Mercy".
Though Gandhi gave the traditional role a new vigour, he had undaunted faith in the chastity and purity of woman. He was sure that the "dazzling purity" of a woman could disarm even the most beastly of men. In his opinion, an ideal woman would rather give up her life than her purity. Construction of the woman in such terms seems to be at times too idealistic in contemporary times. According to Madhu Kishwar, "Gandhi's very vocabulary, in its exaggerated idealization of women as 'sisters of mercy' and 'mothers of entire humanity' reveals the bias of a benevolent patriarch."
And yet, there is something in his ideas that is essentially radical. He did not see women as helpless objects of reform. Neither did he think of bringing change only in some spheres of life, such as marriage or education. His vision of change was comprehensive. He connected the moral with the political, the social and the economic, presenting an eclectic view of life. For him the means had to be identified with the ends; similarly, he did not differentiate between the private and the public worlds of women. He also enhanced the dignity of woman's housework, advising his men followers to take to spinning and to do ordinary works in everyday life. He himself imbibed so many of a woman's qualities, that he became 'mother' to many.
Gandhi saw that the low status of women was the result of prejudices arid adverse traditions, which were centuries old. It was difficult to get women interested in the larger problems of life and society because they knew nothing of them, having never been allowed to breathe the fresh air of freedom. The only factor that would enable women to come out of this situation was the determination and strength of the women themselves. Though men should help in the cause of women, ultimately women will have to determine their destinies. Gandhi sympathizes with women, but he does not want to pity them all the time. Neither does he want them to be irresponsible, pleasure-loving beings.
In Gandhi's philosophy, the women of India found a new identity. His words and deeds have inspired thousands of women, and will continue to do so, in their struggle against injustice and inequality.
Economics, Ethics
I must confess that I do not draw a sharp or any distinction between economics and ethics. Economics that hurt the moral well-being of an individual or a nation are immoral and, therefore, sinful. Thus the economics that permit one country to prey upon another are immoral. It is sinful to buy and use articles made by sweated labour. ( Young India,13-10-1921, p. 325)
The economics that disregard moral and sentimental considerations are like wax works that, being life-like, still lack the life of the living flesh. At every crucial moment thus anew-fangled economic laws have broken down in practice. And nations or individuals who accept them as guiding maxims must perish. ( Young India, 27-10-1921, p. 344)
That economics is untrue which ignores or disregards moral values. The extension of the law of non-violence in the domain of economics means nothing less than the introduction of moral values as a factor to be considered in regulating international commerce.( Young India, 26-10-1924, p. 421)
Ideal Economy
According to me the economic constitution of India and, for the matter of that, the world should be such that no one under should suffer from want of food and clothing. In other words, everybody should be able to get sufficient work to enable him to make the two ends meet.
And this ideal can universally realized only if the means of production of the elementary necessaries of life remain in the control of the masses. These should be freely available to all as God’s air and water are or ought to be; they should not be made vehicle of traffic for the exploitation of others. This monopolization by any country, nation or group of persons would be unjust. The neglect of this simple principle is the cause of destitution that we witness today not only in this unhappy land but other parts of the world too.( Young India,15-11-1928, p381)
True economics never militates against the highest ethical standard, just as all true ethics to be worth its name must at the same time be also good economics. An economics that inculcates Mammon worship, and enables the strong to amass wealth at the expense of the weak, is a false and dismal science. It spells death. True economics, on the other hand, stands for social justice, it promotes the good of all equally including the weakest, and is indispensable for decent life.( Harijan, 9-10-1937, p.292)
If we will but cleanse our houses, our palaces and temples of the attributes of wealth and show in them the attributes of morality, we can offer battle to any combinations of hostile forces without having to carry the burden of a heavy militia. Let us seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, and the irreovocable promise is that everything will be added unto us. These are real economics. May you and I treasure them and enforce them in our life! (Speeches and Writings of Mahatma Gandhi, p. 355)
Minimum Violence
Strictly speaking, no activity and no industry is possible without a certain amount of violence, no matter how little. Even the very process of living is impossible without a certain amount of violence. What we have to do is to minimize it to the greatest extent possible. Indeed the very word non-violence, a negative word, means that it is an effort to abandon the violence that is inevitable in life. Therefore, whoever believes in ahimsa will engage himself in occupations that involve the least possible violence.
Thus, for instance, one cannot conceive of a man believing in non-violence carrying on the occupation of a butcher. Not that a meat-eater cannot be non-violent but even a meat-eater believing in non-violence will not go in for shikar, and he will not engage in war or war preparations. Thus there are many activities and occupations which necessarily involve violence and must be eschewed by a non-violent man.
But there is agriculture without which life is impossible, and which does involve a certain amount of violence. The determining factor therefore is the occupation founded on violence? But since all activity involves some measure of violence, all we have to do is to minimize the violence involved in it. This is not possible without a heart-belief in non-violence.
Suppose there is a man who does no actual violence, who labours for his bread, but who is always consumed with envy at other people’s wealth or prosperity. He is not non-violent. A non-violent occupation is thus that occupation, which is fundamentally free from violence and which, involves no exploitation or envy of others.
Rural Economics
Now I have no historical proof, but I believe that there was a time in India when village economics were organized on the basis of such non-violent occupations, not on the basis of rights of man but on the duties of man. Those who engaged themselves in such occupations did earn their living, but their labour contributed to the good of the community.
Body labour was at the core of these occupations and industries, and there was no large-scale machinery. For when a man is content to own only so much land as he can till with his own labour, he cannot exploit others. Handicrafts exclude exploitation and slavery.
Gandhi's Views On Economics
Excerpts from 'The Great Sentinel'
It was our love of foreign cloth that ousted the wheel from its position of dignity. Therefore I consider it a sin to wear foreign cloth.
I must confess that I do not draw a sharp or any distinction between economics and ethics. Economics that hurt the moral well-being of an individual or a nation are immoral and therefore sinful. Thus the economics that permit one country to prey upon another are immoral. It is sinful to buy and use articles made by sweated labour. It is sinful to eat American wheat and let my neighbour the grain-dealer starve for want of custom. Similarly it is sinful for me to wear the latest finery of Regent Street, when I know that if I had but worn the things woven by the neighbouring spinners and weavers, that would have clothed me, and fed and clothed them. On the knowledge of my sin bursting upon me, I must consign the foreign garments to the flames and thus purify myself, and thenceforth rest content with the rough khadi made by my neighbours. On knowing that my neighbours may not, having given up the occupation, take kindly to the spinning-wheel, I must take it up myself and thus make it popular.
- Young India, 13-10-1921
I would say that if the village perishes India will perish too. India will be no more India. Her own mission in the world will get lost. The revival of the village is possible only when it is no more exploited. Industrialization on a mass scale will necessarily lead to passive or active exploitation of the villagers as the problems of competition and marketing come in. Therefore we have to concentrate on the village being self-contained, manufacturing mainly for use. Provided this character of the village industry is maintained, there would be no objection to villagers using even the modern machines and tools that they can make and can afford to use. Only they should not be used as a means of exploitation of others.
THE REAL India lies in the 7,00,000 villages. If Indian civilization is to make its full contribution to the building up of a stable world order, it is this vast mass of humanity that has.to be made to live again.
We have to tackle the triple malady which holds our villages fast in its grip : (I) want of corporate sanitation ; (ii) deficient diet; (iii) inertia . . . They [villagers] are not interested in their own welfare. They don't appreciate modern sanitary methods. They don't want to exert themselves beyond scratching their farms or doing such labour as they are used to. These difficulties are real and serious. But they must not baffle us
We must have an unquenchable faith in our mission. We must be patient with the people. We are ourselves novices in village work. We have to deal with a chronic disease. Patience and perseverance, if we have them, overcome mountains of difficulties. We are like nurses who may not leave their patients because they are reported to have an incurable disease.
Villages have suffered long from neglect by those who have had the benefit of education. They have chosen the city life. The village movement is an attempt to establish healthy contact with the villages by inducing those who are fired with the spirit of service to settle in them and find self-expression in the service of villagers.
Those who have settled in villages in the spirit of service are not dismayed by the difficulties facing them. They knew before they went that they would have to contend against many difficulties, including even sullenness on the part of villagers. Only those, therefore, who have faith in themselves and in their mission will serve the villagers and influence their lives.
Workers
A true life lived amongst the people is in itself an object lesson that must produce its own effect upon immediate surroundings. The difficulty with the young is, perhaps, that he has gone to the village merely to earn a living without the spirit of service behind it.
I admit that village life does not offer attractions to those who go there in search of money. Without the incentive of service village life would jar after the novelty has worn out. No young man having gone to a village may abandon the pursuit on the slightest contact with difficulty. Patient effort will show that villagers are not very different from city-dwellers and that they will respond to kindness and attention.
It is no doubt true that one does not have in the villages the opportunity of contact with the great ones of the land. With the growth of village mentality the leaders will find it necessary to tour in the villages and establish a living touch with them. Moreover, the companionship of the great and the good is available to all through the works of saints like Chaitanya, Ramakrishna, Tulsidas, Kabir, Nanak, Dadu, Tukaram, Tiruvalluvar, and others too numerous to mention, though equally known and pious.
Literature
The difficulty is to get the mind tuned to the reception of permanent values. If it is modern thought-political, social, economic, scientific-that is meant, it is possible to procure literature that will satisfy curiosity. I admit, however, that one does not find such as easily as one finds religious literature. Saints wrote and spoke for the masses. The vogue for translating modern thought to the masses in an acceptable manner has not yet quite set in. but it must come in time.
I would, therefore, advise young men. Not to give in, but persist in their effort and by their presence make the villages more livable and lovable. That they will do by serving the villages in a manner acceptable to the villagers. Everyone can make a beginning by making the villages cleaner by their own labour and removing illiteracy to the extent of their ability. And if their lives are clean, methodical and industrious, there is no doubt that the infection will spread in the villages in which they may be working.
Samagra Gramaseva
A Samagra Gramaseva must know everybody living in the village and render them such service as he can. That does not mean that the worker will be able to do everything single-handed. He will show them the way of helping themselves and procure for them such help and materials as they require. He will train up his own helpers. He will so win over the villagers that they will seek and follow his advice.
Supposing I go and settle down in a village with a GHANI (village oil press), I won't be an ordinary GHANCHI (oil presser) earning 15-20 rupees a month. I will be a Mahatma GHANCHI. I will be a Mahatma GHANCHI. I have used the word 'Mahatma' in fun , but what I mean to say is that as a GHANCHI I will become a model for the villagers to follow. I will be a GHANCHI who knows the Gita and the Quran. I will be learned enough to teach their children. I may not be able to do so for lack of time. The villagers will come to me and ask me: "Please make arrangements for our children's education". I will tell them: "I can find you a teacher, but you will have to bear the expenses". And they will be prepared to do so most willingly.
I will teach them spinning and when they come and ask me for the services of a weaver, I will find them a weaver on the same terms as I found them a teacher. And the weaver will teach them how to weave their own cloth. I will inculcate in them the importance of hygiene and sanitation, and when they come and ask me for a sweeper, I will tell them: "I will be your sweeper and I will train you all in the job."
This is my conception of Samagra Gramaseva. You may tell me that I will never find a GHANCHI of this description in this age. Then I will say that we cannot hope to improve our villages in this age. . . . After all, the man who runs an oil mill is a GHANCHI. He has money but his strength does not lie in his money. Real strength lies in knowledge. True knowledge gives a moral standing and moral strength. Everyone seeks the advice of such a man.
Economic Survey
The villages will be surveyed and a list prepared of things that can be manufactured locally with little or no help which may be required for village use or for sale outside, such for instance as GHANI-pressed oil and cakes, burning oil prepared through GHANIS, hand-pounded rice, TADGUD, honey, toys, mats, hand-made paper, village soap, etc. if enough care is thus taken, the villages, most of them as good as dead or dying, will hum with life and exhibit the immense possibilities they have of supplying most of their wants themselves and of the cities and towns of India.
Arts And Crafts
The villagers should develop such a high degree of skill that articles prepared by them should command a ready market outside. When our villages are fully developed, there will be no dearth in them of men with a high degree of skill and artistic talent. There will be village poets, village artists, village architects, linguists and research workers. In shout, there will be nothing in life worth having which will not be had in the villages.
Today the villages are dung heaps. Tomorrow they will be like tiny gardens of Eden where dwell highly intelligent folk whom no one can deceive or exploit. The reconstruction of the villages along these lines should begin right now. The reconstruction of the villages should not be organized on a temporary but permanent basis.
Economic Reorganization
In my writing on cent per cent Swadeshi. I have shown how some aspects of it can be tackled immediately with benefit to the starving millions both economically and hygienically. The richest in the land can share the benefit. Thus, if rice can be pounded in the villages after the old fashion, the wages will fill the pockets of the rice-pounding sisters and the rice-eating millions will get some sustenance from the unpolished rice instead of pure starch which the polished rice provides.
Human greed, which takes no account of the health or the wealth of the people who come under its heels, is responsible for the hideous rice-mills one sees in all the rice-producing tracts. If public opinion was strong, it will make rice-mills an impossibility by simply insisting on unpolished rice and appealing to the owner of rice-mills to stop a traffic that undermines the health of a whole nation and robs the poor of an honest means of livelihood.
...I would say that, if the village perishes, India will perish too. India will be no more India. Her own mission in the world will get lost. The revival of the village is possible only when it is no more exploited. Industrialization on a mass scale will necessarily lead to passive or active exploitation of the villagers as the problems of competition and marketing come in.
Therefore, we have to concentrate on the village being self-contained, manufacturing mainly for use. Provided this character of the village industry is maintained, there would be no objection to villagers using even the modern machines and tools that they can make and can afford to use. Only, they should not be used as a means of exploitation of others.
Nonviolent Economy
You cannot build nonviolence on a factory civilization, but it can be built on self-contained villages... Rural economy as I have conceived it, eschews exploitation altogether, and exploitation is the essence of violence. You have, therefore, to be rural-minded before you can be non-violent, and to be rural-minded you have to have faith in the spinning wheel.
We have to make a choice between India of the villages that are as ancient as herself and India of the cities which are a creation of foreign domination. Today the cities dominate and drain the villages so that they are crumbling to ruin. My Khadi mentality tells me that cities must subserve villages when that domination goes. Exploiting of villages is itself organized violence. If we want Swaraj to be built on nonviolence, we will have to give the villages their proper place.
Food Reform
Since the economic reorganization of the villages has been commenced with food reform, it is necessary to find out the simplest and cheapest foods that would enable the villagers to regain the lost health. The addition of green leaves to their meals will enable the villagers to avoid many diseases from which they are now suffering.
The villagers' food is deficient in vitamins; many of them can be supplied by fresh green leaves. An eminent doctor told me a proper use of green leaves is calculated to revolutionize the customary notions of food and much of what was today being supplied by mild may be supplied by green leaves.261
Power Machinery
If we could have electricity in every village home, I should not mind villagers plying their implements and tools, with the help of electricity. But then the village communities or the State would own power-houses just as they have their grazing pastures. But where there is no electricity and no machinery, what are idle hands to do.
I regard the existence of power wheels for the grinding of corn in thousands of villages as the limit of our helplessness. I suppose India does not produce all the engines or grinding machines..... The planting of such machinery and engines on a large scale in villages is also a sign of greed. Is it proper to fill one's pocket in this manner at the expense of the poor? Every such machinery puts thousands of hand-CHAKKIS out of work and takes away employment from thousand of housewives and artisans who make these CHAKKIS.
Moreover, the process is infective and will spread to every village industry. The decay of the latter spells too the decay of art. If it meant replacement of old crafts by new ones, one might not have much to say against it. But this is not what is happening. In the thousands of villages where power machinery exists, one misses the sweet music, in the early morning, of the grinders at work.
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