Talk:Mahātmā Gāndhī
By Vishal Agarwal
The life of Mahātmā Gāndhī exemplifies numerous Hindu values and ideals in modern times. Following are some of the incidents in his life that can teach a lot to us.
Story: Mahātmā Gāndhī responds to an Abusive Letter Once, a critic of Mahātmā Gāndhī wrote him a very long letter. Gāndhī patiently read the letter carefully, going over page after page of abuse. He did not seem to get bothered at all by the nonsense written in that letter. After he completed reading it, he removed the paper clip holding the pages, and placed it inside his small box of stationary items for future use. Then he just crumpled the letter and threw the sheets in a recycle bin because they were of no use to him. This story demonstrates the value of freedom from anger (akrodha).
Story: The Kindness of Mahātmā Gāndhī reforms a Thief One night a thief entered the āśrama of Mahātmā Gāndhī. Someone woke up with the sound and saw the thief. He woke up other people in the āśrama and they caught the thief. They kept him in one room and waited for the morning. In the morning they took the thief to Gāndhījī. The thief was shivering with fear. Gāndhī looked at the thief and asked, “Did you have breakfast?” Gāndhī then looked at the manager of the āśrama and said, “Why, is he not a human being? First feed him. We will talk of punishment later.” The thief was touched by the kindness and changed his behavior to correct himself. This story illustrates the power of the Hindu value of forgiveness (kṣamā).
Story: Mahātmā Gāndhī sleeps peacefully before a Press Conference Before 1947, India was ruled by the British government. Once, Mahātmā Gāndhī visited London to negotiate India’s independence. He was to have a press conference the following day. As usual, it was expected that the newspersons would try to corner him with their trick questions, and embarrass him.
The newspersons reached the place where he was residing the previous night. They were surprised to find that Mahātmā Gāndhī was sleeping peacefully.
One of the newspersons asked his secretary, “Is Gāndhī not tense or stressed about the press conference tomorrow? Any normal person would not be able to even sleep the previous night.”
The secretary replied, “Mahātmā Gāndhī is not afraid of your questions and is not worried about preparing for the answers. His mind is very clear, and he does not say one thing and mean another. When you ask him any question, he will answer exactly what is in his mind. So why should he get worried and lose his sleep?”
A day before he was about to see King George VI, the British Emperor, a reporter commented about Gāndhī’s simple clothing, “You will be seeing the King. Don’t you think you should be wearing something more substantial and decent?” Mahātmā Gāndhī smiled and replied, “I think the King is wearing enough clothes for both of us!”
Another reporter asked him, “What do you think of Western Civilization?” Mahātmā Gāndhī replied, “I think it is a good idea!” [What he meant to say was that some westerners consider themselves as more civilized than other human beings, forgetting that the worst acts of savagery and barbarianism in human history have often been conducted by the western countries. In those times, most Indians did not have the courage to show the mirror to their colonial masters.]
These incidents demonstrate his practice of the Hindu values of straightforwardness (ārjavam), simple living and non-materialism (aparigraha), as well as truth (satya).
Why did Mahātmā Gāndhī wear Shoddy Clothing? Once Mahātmā Gāndhī went on a tour of a village in India. He reached a hut in which lived a family comprising several individuals. Surprisingly, the individuals would come out only one at a time to see him. When the first individual went back in, the second came out. When the second went back in, the third came out.
Mahātmā Gāndhī was surprised at this behavior of the family and asked the other villagers as to why they did not come all out at once to greet him. A villager replied, “Mahatma-jī, they are a very poor family. They have only one piece of cloth to cover their upper half of the body. Therefore, they are forced to share this piece of cloth, and come out only one person at a time so that they are fully covered in front of you.”
Mahātmā Gāndhī was very hurt to hear this. He thought that if his own countrymen were that poor, he had no right to wear multiple clothes on his own body. From that day onwards, he decided that he will wear only one cloth on his body. And from that day, the rich lawyer Gāndhī who was fond of wearing expensive clothing now wore only a loin cloth to cover himself, wherever he went.
Story: Practice what you Preach Once a lady came to Mahātmā Gāndhī with her young son and complained to Mahātmā that her son was guilty of the bad habit of eating jaggery many times every day and requested Gāndhī to advise him to give up the bad habit since it was bad for health. Gāndhī asked the lady to come after 15 days with the boy.
She returned after 15 days. Now Gāndhī took the boy to a corner and pointed out how eating too much jaggery would produce heat in his body and why he has to leave that bad habit. After two months, that lady came back to Gāndhī to thank him since her son had given up that habit on Gāndhī’s advice.
However, the lady was curious to know why he asked her to come after 15 days. When she asked, Gāndhī replied, “Oh my child, when you first came to me, I was not in a position to advise your son to give up eating jaggery because I myself ate too much of it. In order to advise him, I had to first overcome my own bad habit. Therefore I took 15 days’ time during which I got rid of my own habit, and only then did I become qualified to advise your son. How can a man preach something when he is not already following that?”