Who Was Mahatma Gandhi?

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was born in Porbandar, in Gujarat, India on October 2, 1869.

He was a major political and spiritual leader in India, and one of the primary figures in the Indian independence movement. Some people credit him with inventing Satyagraha, the philosophy of non-violent resistance. He is colloquially known as Mahatma, or “Great Soul” and Bapu, or “Father.”

Gandhi was educated in Britain as a lawyer. Unlike most Indians, Gandhi enjoyed a very privileged education - indeed, in 1951, over 50 years after he began college, the literacy rate in India was only 18.4%. Even today, at 65.5%, India has one of the lowest literacy rates of any developed nation. After college and a stint in India, Gandhi moved to South Africa, where most historians claim he first employed Satyagraha. He lived in South Africa from 1893-1914, reputedly engaging in many civil rights struggles during this time. In 1914 he returned to India, where he began to help organize protests against taxation and other issues.

Considered the Father of the Nation, his birthday, known as Gandhi Jayanti, is a national holiday. He assumed leadership of the Indian National Congress, making Swaraj, or Indian independence, his main focus. Some of Gandhi’s best known activities were the Dandi Salt March tax protest of 1930 and the Quit India independence movement of 1942. Several of Gandhi’s years were spent in prison, partly due to his frequent protests. Additionally, he is commonly presumed to have campaigned for the alleviation of poverty, equality of the sexes, interfaith cooperation and understanding, and an end to caste discrimination and untouchability. However, as discussed throughout this site, not all these claims are necessarily objectively true.

Gandhi believed in extremely simple living. He made his own clothes, and in later life wore only the traditional Indian dhoti and shawl woven with a charkha. He also ate a simple vegetarian diet, from which he often abstained during his frequent, rigorous, and lengthy fasts, which he used for both self-purification and protest. His teachings and life have been considered inspirations for Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Steve Biko of South Africa and Aung San Suu Kyi of Myanmar.

Finally, Gandhi was a very passionate advocate of Hinduism, claiming: “It cannot be said that Sikhism, Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism are separate religions. All these four faiths and their offshoots are one. Hinduism is an ocean into which all the rivers run. It can absorb Islam and Christianity and all other religions and only then can it become the ocean.”

Gandhi was assassinated in New Delhi, India by former Hindu fundamentalist Nathuram Godse on January 30, 1948. Godse was convicted of Gandhi’s murder and executed on November 15, 1949, despite the supposed dedication to non-violence of Gandhism. The memorial of Raj Ghat in Delhi was created to mark the location of Gandhi’s cremation.

This is the official story of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi. Our website is dedicated to telling the rest of the story.