Mahatma gandhi biography in english
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Early Life
Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was born on October 2, 1869, at Porbandar, in the present-day Indian state of Gujarat. His father was the dewan (chief minister) of Porbandar; his deeply religious mother was a devoted practitioner of Vaishnavism (worship of the Hindu god Vishnu), influenced by Jainism, an ascetic religion governed by tenets of self-discipline and nonviolence. At the age of 19, Mohandas left home to study law in London at the Inner Temple, one of the city’s four law colleges. Upon returning to India in mid-1891, he set up a law practice in Bombay, but met with little success. He soon accepted a position with an Indian firm that sent him to its office in South Africa. Along with his wife, Kasturbai, and their children, Gandhi remained in South Africa for nearly 20 years.
Did you know? In the famous Salt March of April-May 1930, thousands of Indians followed Gandhi from Ahmadabad to the Arabian Sea. The march resulted in the arrest of nearly 60,000 people, including Gandhi himself.
Gandhi was appalled by the discrimination he experienced as an Indian imm
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In the 1940s, a powerful empire was defeated by a man of peace dressed in simple clothes.
He was Mohandas K Gandhi.
At that time, India was part of the British Empire, a group of countries ruled by Britain and Britain decided their laws.
Gandhi believed this was wrong. He thought India should be ruled by Indian people.
He wanted change but through peace, not violence.
Aged 23, Gandhi moved to South Africa, where one event changed the rest of his life. He was thrown off a train carriage which was just for white people. Because of this unfair treatment he returned to India, determined to work for change.
Gandhi started making many peaceful protests.
He now dressed in white cotton clothes to show he was living simply like the poor.
He wanted Indians to stop buying British things.
In 1930, he led the Salt March, a protest against the British who were selling salt to Indians. Indians needed salt to stay healthy. They wanted to make their own because it was cheaper. But the British said, "No".
Gandhi's protest was very important. Because of it, he was arrested a
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Mohandas Gandhi
Mohandas Gandhi, icon of Indian liberation, remains an inspiration for anti-capitalists and peace activists globally. His campaigns for national liberation based on non-violence and mass civil disobedience were critical to defeating the power of the British Empire.
This biography examines his campaigns from South Africa to India to evaluate the successes and failures of non-violent resistance. Seventy years after his death, his legacy remains contested: was he a saint, revolutionary, class conciliator, or self-obsessed spiritual zealot?
The contradictions of Gandhi’s politics are unpicked through an analysis of the social forces at play in the mass movement around him. Entrusted to liberate the oppressed of India, his key support base were industrialists, landlords and the rich peasantry. Gandhi’s moral imperatives often clashed with these vested material interests, as well as with more radical currents to his left.
Today, our world is scarred by permanent wars, racism and violence, environmental destruction and economic crisis. Can non-violent resistance w
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