Gandhi has been presented as a 'Mahatma', the Father of our nation, who gave freedom to India. I submit this is a myth carefully built up by the British and certain other vested interests. What is the truth. ?
When Gandhi came to India from South Africa ( where he practised law for about 20 years ) in about 1915 the Congress party was confined to some intellectuals, and had little mass following. Gandhi thought that since India is a deeply religious country the best way to build up a mass following would be use of religion. So from 1915 till his death in 1948 in almost every public meeting and his writings he would propagate Hindu religious ideas like Ramraj, cow protection, varnashram, brahmachrya, etc ( see 'The Collected works of 'Mahatma Gandhi ', which is a Govt. of India publication in several volumes ).
This indeed converted the Congress from a party of only intellectuals to a mass party. But it was a mass party of the Hindu masses alone. How could the Muslims join such a party which appealed to Hindu sentiments ? In fact such an appeal to religion necessarily drove the Muslim masses to a Muslim communal organization-- the Muslim League. And prior to 1947 Muslims comprised of about 25% of the population of undivided India ( this percentage was reduced to about 17-18% after 1947 because a section of Muslims became citizens of Pakistan ).
Did this not serve the British policy of divide and rule ? And therefore was Gandhi not objectively a British agent ?
In his book 'The Partition of India ' the eminent jurist Seervai has written that the method of Gandhi of appealing to Hindu ideas may have mobilized the Hindu masses, but it inevitably led to Partition of India.
Thus while Gandhi claimed he was secular, that was only hypocrisy. In fact he was communal.
Unfortunately most people in India have not read the speeches and writings of Gandhi from 1915 to 1948, and so they do not know what he had done, and they have been taken for a ride. It is high time for them to know the truth.
Some people say that the fact that Gandhi went to Noakhali etc in 1947 to appeal for communal amity shows that he was secular. But in fact this was the typical hypocrisy of Gandhi ( see my blogs ' Chalak Pakhandi ' and ' Here is the Father of your Nation ' on justicekatju.blogspot.in ). First you set the house on fire by propagating Hindu religious ideas day in and day out for several decades, and then when the house is burning you do the drama of trying to douse the flames by appealing for communal harmony. Why did you set the house on fire in the first place ?
Some people ask : what did Gandhi get by this ? My answer is that different people have different motivations. For some money is the motivation, for others power. in Gandhi's case it was probably power ( he was effectively the leader of the Congress ) and the desire to be called a 'Mahatma'. However, that is irrelevant.Whatever may have been his motivation, the real question to be asked is : did his actions in fact further the British policy of divide and rule ? That is why I have called Gandhi objectively a British agent. Subjectively he may have any motivation. An objective agent may not receive any money, and he may not even be conscious of the fact that he is working as an agent. But that does not matter. If by your deeds you are in fact serving the interests of a foreign power, you are an agent of that foreign power.
As regards the claim that Gandhi gave us freedom,this again is a myth. Does any country give up its empire without an armed fight for independence ? Did America get independence from England by satyagrah and hunger strikes, or by mobilizing the Continental Army under George Washington.which fought the American war of Independence from 1775-1781 ? Did Bolivar liberate several Latin American countries with guns or presenting flowers and bouquets to the Spanish rulers ? Did Ho Chi Minh defeat the French by use of arms, or by salt marches ?
It is said by some that if the Indian people had resorted to arms against the British rulers there would have been a lot of bloodshed. That is true, but then that is the price a people must pay for getting freedom.
In fact our real freedom fighters, Bhagat Singh, Chandrashekhar Azad, Surya Sen ( Masterda ), Ashfaqulla, Ram Prasad Bismil, Khudiram Bose, Rajguru, Sukhdev, etc realized this and took up arms against the British in the early 20th century.. This was no doubt only the beginning of a nationwide armed fight against the British, and was therefore only on a very small scale. But later on it would have developed into a full blown War of Independence. But Gandhi successfully diverted this genuine freedom struggle towards a harmless channel called satyagrah, which was sentimental nonsense, and which would do no real harm to the British. Would a great power like Britain give up its Empire because Gandhi was going frequently on fasts and singing Raghupati Raghav Raja Ram in public meetings ? The names of our real freedom fighters ( mentioned above ) have been relegated to the footnotes of our history books, and they have been painted as mavericks and deviants, while that fraud Gandhi is given the credit of winning freedom for us
So who was responsible for Independence in 1947 ? Let me explain.
In the Second World War, which started in 1939, Germany attacked England, and considerably weakened it. Possibly Germany would have conquered England, had it not been for American help. But this help came at a price. The Americans put pressure on the British to give up their empire in india, so that India may be opened up for American enterprize and investments too. This is the real cause of independence to india. It had nothing to do with Gandhi.
I am reproducing below my blog which started this debate
Gandhi---A British Agent
This post is bound to draw a lot of flak at me, but that does not matter as I am not a popularity seeker I have often said things knowing that initially that will make me very unpopular, and I will be vilified and denounced by many. Nevertheless I say such things.as I believe they must be said in my country's interest.
I submit that Gandhi was objectively a British agent who did great harm to India.
These are my reasons for saying this :
1. India has tremendous diversity, so many religions, castes, races, languages, etc ( see my article ' What is India ?' ). Realizing this the British policy was of divide and rule ( see online ' History in the Service of Imperialism ' , which is a speech delivered by Prof. B.N. Pande in the Rajya Sabha ).
By constantly injecting religion into politics continuously for several decades, Gandhi furthered the British policy of divide and rule.
If we read Gandhi's public speeches and writings ( e.g. in his newspapers 'Young India', ' Harijan ', etc ) we find that ever since Gandhi came to India from South Africa in 1915 or so till his death in 1948, in almost every speech or article he would emphasize Hindu religious ideas e.g. Ramrajya, Go Raksha ( cow protection ), brahmacharya ( celibacy ), varnashram dharma ( caste system ), etc ( see Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi ).
Thus Gandhi wrote in ' Young India ' on 10.6.1921 " I am a Sanatani Hindu. I believe in the varnashram dharma. I believe in protection of the cow ". In his public meetings the Hindu bhajan ' Raghupati Raghav Raja Ram ' would be loudly sung.
Now Indians are a religious people, and they were even more religious in the first half of the 20th century. A sadhu or swamiji may preach such ideas to his followers in his ashram, but when they are preached day in and day out by a political leader, what effect will these speeches and writings have on an orthodox Muslim mind ? It would surely drive him towards a Muslim organization like the Muslim League, and so it did. Was this not serving the British policy of divide and rule ? By constantly injecting religion into politics for several decades, was Gandhi not objectively acting as a British agent ?
2. In India a revolutionary movement against British rule had started in the early 20th century under the Anushilan Samiti, Jugantar, and revolutionaries like Surya Sen, Ramprasad Bismil ( who wrote the song ' Sarfaroshi ki tamanna ab hamare dil mein hai ), Chandrashekhar Azad, Ashfaqulla, Bhagat Singh, Rajguru, etc ( who were all hanged by the British ). Gandhi successfully diverted the freedom struggle from this revolutionary direction to a harmless nonsensical channel called Satyagrah. This also served British interests.
3. Gandhi's economic ideas were thoroughly reactionary. He advocated self sufficient village communities, though everybody knows that these communities were totally casteist and in the grip of landlords and money lenders..Gandhi was against industrialization, and preached handspinning by charkha and other such reactionary nonsense. Similarly, his ' trusteeship ' theory was all nonsense, and an act of deceiving the people
Some people praise Gandhi's bravery in going to Noakhali, etc to douse the communal violence at the time of Partition. But the question is why did he help setting the house on fire in the first place by preaching religious ideas in public political meetings for several decades, which were bound to divide the Indian people on religious lines? First you set the house on fire, and then you do the drama of trying to douse the flames.
Please also see the next two posts
What you write here are well known things that had been well understood by those minority class of unbiased intelligentsia in India. But the majority Indians hardly read and digest unpalatable realities. You said it right:
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately most people in India have not read the speeches and writings of Gandhi from 1915 to 1948, and so they do not know what he had done, and they have been taken for a ride. It is high time for them to know the truth.
Saya ingin menyampaikan kepada seluruh TKI yang bekerja di negeri orang saya ibu hermawati seorang TKI DI MALAYSIA pengen pulang ke indo tapi gak ada ongkos sempat saya putus asah apalagi dengan keadaan susah gaji suami itupun buat makan sedangkan hutang banyak kebetulan suami saya buka-buka internet mendapatkan nomor MBAH RONO katanya bisa bantu orang melunasi hutang melalui jalan TOGEL dengan keadaan susah jadi saya coba hubungi MBAH RONO dan minta angka bocoran MALAYSIA angka yang di berikan 4D TOTO ternyata betul-betul tembus 100% bagi saudarah-saudara di indo mau di luar negeri apabila punya masalah hutang sudah lama belum lunas jangan putus asah beliau bisa membantu meringankan masalah anda hubungi MBAH RONO di nomor (_085_340_489-469_) ini asli bukan rekayasa atau silahkan buktikan sendiri..
ReplyDeleteSaya ingin menyampaikan kepada seluruh TKI yang bekerja di negeri orang saya ibu hermawati seorang TKI DI MALAYSIA pengen pulang ke indo tapi gak ada ongkos sempat saya putus asah apalagi dengan keadaan susah gaji suami itupun buat makan sedangkan hutang banyak kebetulan suami saya buka-buka internet mendapatkan nomor MBAH RONO katanya bisa bantu orang melunasi hutang melalui jalan TOGEL dengan keadaan susah jadi saya coba hubungi MBAH RONO dan minta angka bocoran MALAYSIA angka yang di berikan 4D TOTO ternyata betul-betul tembus 100% bagi saudarah-saudara di indo mau di luar negeri apabila punya masalah hutang sudah lama belum lunas jangan putus asah beliau bisa membantu meringankan masalah anda hubungi MBAH RONO di nomor (_085_340_489-469_) ini asli bukan rekayasa atau silahkan buktikan sendiri..
ReplyDeleteSo you think that independence can be achieved with 1000-2000 swords, 200-500 guns, 200-300 naxalites, throwing 5-6 bombs. If this would be true than India had been achieved it in 1857.
ReplyDeleteI think you not read 10th class high school. Main cause of failure of 1857, Bhagat Singh, and around all rebellion is lack of nationality in civilians. Every naxalites group is fighting with British force but which people were in British force, Indians.
What Gandhi did: awake people, civilians, to participate in struggle and this is the only cause when British were busy in second world war and need manpower support from India but failing to get the same then they run away to save their own country.
Subhash Chandra Bose was the second reason for independence, he and his INA forced British to leave India.
What was your marks in high school?
So you think that independence can be achieved with 1000-2000 swords, 200-500 guns, 200-300 naxalites, throwing 5-6 bombs. If this would be true than India had been achieved it in 1857.
ReplyDeleteI think you not read 10th class high school. Main cause of failure of 1857, Bhagat Singh, and around all rebellion is lack of nationality in civilians. Every naxalites group is fighting with British force but which people were in British force, Indians.
What Gandhi did: awake people, civilians, to participate in struggle and this is the only cause when British were busy in second world war and need manpower support from India but failing to get the same then they run away to save their own country.
Subhash Chandra Bose was the second reason for independence, he and his INA forced British to leave India.
What was your marks in high school?
History of Indian freedom struggle is a complicated matter as it can be explained from various angle.You have raised some valid point.My point is Gandhi had limited options as India was not a homogeneous or monolithic society.For a successful armed rebellion against the British,we needed united Indian fighters.In 1857,it was tried but it failed because many of the Indian princely states took the side of the British and also many Indians including the so called martial groups fought for British armed forces.In american independence war or Latin American war native people hardly fought against each other,If it did not not happen then i think Washington or Bolivar could not deliver independence to their respective homelands.Assistance from abroad was not possible at that time as other European powers left India after being defeated by British and European political situation was too volatile.It is true that Gandhi was partially responsible for mixing religion with politics but he cannot be entirely blamed.Due to loss of power and proximity of Hindu elites with British education system and administration,Muslim population&elites were not happy,The Aligarh movement by Sir Syed Ahmed is the ample proof of that phenomenon(whether it was planted by British or not is a question of another platform).Gandhi realized the fact that most of the people of India were living in the villages(which is still true in spite of 68 years of Indian independence) and before British village economy was almost healthy including their labour intensive cottage industries if not entirely self-sufficient and those villages were the pillars of India.He tried to revive the idea may be through mere symbolism as the village economy was systematically destroyed by British policies. Gandhi also realized that India did not have the technological or monetary capacity to set up modern industries at that moment as at one side Britishers were looting India&on the other hand they were imparting insufficient modern technical knowledge to their colonial subjects.So we may look it in a different way that Gandhi was promoting self-confidence among the Indians.Gandhi took the shelter of religion because at that moment Hindu society was deeply orthodox lacking modern education,So he had to communicate with the Hindu majority in the language of religion.It should be noted majority of Muslim population avoided participation in the struggle against British,so Gandhi had to over-depend on Hindus rightly or wrongly.When i see various political parties connect with the voters in the name of caste,religion,region and get effective votes,then imagine how our society was before 100 years.I am not telling that Gandhi can escape responsibility but when we evaluate him,we need to consider the various circumstances and historical events of that time.I agree that Gandhi might have been over-credited or his role might have been over-emphasized but we cannot out-rightly ignore his contribution.The revolutionaries like Bhagat Singh,Khsudiram must be remembered with due regards but the effects of their deeds were not so enormous which could have thrown out the British.
ReplyDelete