Mahatma Ghandi (1869-1948)

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was born October 2, 1869 in Porbandar, Kathjawar Agency, British India. His father was Karamchand Gandhi, diwan (Prime Minister) of Porbandar. He married Kasturbai Makhanji in May 1883, when he was 13. Together they had four children - Harilal, Manilal, Ramdas and Devdas. He attended school in India and received a good general education and graduated from Samaldas College in Bhavnagar.

On September 4, 1888 he traveled to London were he would seem a former education to study English law at University College London. While away, he adhered to his promise (to his mother) to stay away from meat, alcohol and promiscuity. In fact, he joined the Vegetarian Society, was elected to its executive committee and started a new chapter in Bayswater. He also became acquainted with several members of the Theosophical Society and found an interest in Hindu and Christian scriptures. He was called to the bar on June 10, 1891 and left for India on June 12th. He tried to start a practice in Mumbai but was unable to get it started. In 1893 he was offered a post at the Colony of Natal, South Africa with Dada Abdulla & Co. It was during this trip that Ghandi witnessed, first hand, the prejudices and injustices against Indians in South Africa. He was thrown off a train in Pietermaritzburg after refusing to move to 3rd class, while holding a valid 1st class ticket. He was beaten by a stagecoach driver when he refused to travel on a foot board to make room for a European passenger.

He founded the Natal Indian Congress in 1894 which helped to mold the Indian community in South Africa into a homogeneous political force. On September 11, 1906 Ghandi adopted his method of "satyagraha" for the first time - a devotion to the truth and non-violent protest. This was due to the Transvaal government adopted a new Act compelling all Indians to register and hold papers. Gandhi asked the Indian population to defy the new law and suffer the punishments for doing so, rather than resist through violent means.


Gandhi returned to India in 1915 and began to speak at the Indian National Congress. But it wasn't until 1918 that Gandhi began to really make a difference. He learned that the people in Champaran were being supressed by the militia of their landlords while being given little compensation for their clops, leaving them in poverty and starvation. Gandhi took an account of the travesties taking place in each village and began to build the confidence of the village leaders. He was arrested on charges of creating unrest and ordered to leave the province, which he refused. Hundreds of thousands of people protests and rallied outside the jail, police station and courts and demanded his release, which the court reluctantly agreed.

Over the next decades he would live among the people. He would ride 3rd class or walk, would never allow anyone to serve him as a slave and lived in a simple house. He fought, peacefully, for home rule in India and succeeded in that quest. On two different occasions he fasted until the people of India stopped fighting, which lead to peace in his country.

On January 30, 1948, while having his nightly public walk on the grounds of the Birla Bhavan in New Delhi, Ghandi was shot and killed by Nathuram Godse. Godse was a Hindu radical with links to the extremist Mahasabha, who blammed Ghandi for weakening India by insisting on a payment to Pakistan. Godse and his co-conspirater, Narayan Apte, were tried, convicted and eventually executed on November 19, 1949.