Specially Prepared for Use in Indian Schools

THE STORY OF MY LIFE

BYM. K. GANDHI

Abridged and Simplified with Topics for Essays

byBharatan Kumarappa

NAVAJIVAN PUBLISHING HOUSEAHMEDABAD-380 014

© Navajivan Trust, 1955

First Edition, July 1955This reprint, 15,000 Copies, December 2000

Total : 2,26,000 Copies

The price of this book issubsidised by Navajivan Trust.

ISBN 81-7229-055-1

Printed and Published byJitendra T. Desai

Navajivan Mudranalaya,Ahmedabad-380 014

iii

INTRODUCTION

It is not my purpose to attempt a real autobiography or story of mylife. I simply want to tell the story of my numerous experiments withtruth, and as my life consists of nothing but those experiments, the storywill take the shape of an autobiography. My experiments in the politicalfield are now known. But I should certainly like to narrate my experi-ments in the spiritual field which are known only to myself, and fromwhich I have derived such power as I possess for working in thepolitical field. The experiments I am about to relate are spiritual, orrather moral; for the essence of religion is morality.

Only those matters of religion that can be understood as much bychildren as by older people, will be included in this story. If I cannarrate them in a dispassionate and humble spirit many other experi-ments will ... obtain from them help in their onward march.

The Ashram, Sabarmati, M. K. Gandhi26th November, 1925

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EDITOR'S NOTE

Gandhiji's Autobiography* and his Satyagraha in South Africa+, aspublished in English, run into almost 1000 pages. An abridgement++ ofthese two into a single volume of 283 pages was published in 1952 bythe Navajivan Trust. A request was recently received for a still smallerversion for use in our schools. This book has been specially prepared tomeet the need.

Matters which are not likely to be of much interest to school childrenhave been omitted, and the language has been simplified where possible.Topics for essays and discussions have been suggested at the end ofmost of the chapters. They have been framed to suit both higher andlower classes. Teachers may select from them the questions which arewithin the capacity of their pupils to tackle. An interesting period maybe spent by the class discussing together one or other of the moredifficult topics, and then in another period the pupils may be asked towrite an essay on the topic.

July, 1955 Bharatan Kumarappa

* Published by Navajivan Publishing House, Ahmedabad-380 014, price Rs. 20,Popular Edn.

+ Published by Navajivan Publishing House, Ahmedabad-380 014, price Rs. 15++ i. e. Gandhiji's Autobiography [Abridged], price Rs. 10

v

PUBLISHER'S NOTE

In this reprint of the book, Grammar Exercises framed by Dr. C. N.Zutshi have been omitted as they had been framed according to sylla-buses which have been greatly changed now-a-days. Topics for essaysand discussions have been placed chapterwise at the end of the book.

This book was originally prepared for use in our schools. The pub-lisher is happy to note that, owing to recent resurgence of interest inGandhiji, this book has been prescribed as one of the text-books forcertain general knowledge examinations by some voluntary educationalorganizations. Hence it is expected that this reprint will have a widerarea of utility than the one that was originally intended for it.

May, 1984

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CONTENTS

Chapter PageINTRODUCTION iiiEDITOR'S NOTE ivPUBLISHER’S NOTE v

PART I : CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH1 BIRTH AND PARENTAGE 12 AT SCHOOL 23 MARRIAGE 74 A TRAGIC FRIENDSHIP 85 STEALING 116 MY FATHER’S ILLNESS AND DEATH 137 GLIMPSES OF RELIGION 148 PREPARATION FOR ENGLAND 159 ON BOARD THE SHIP 18

PART II : IN ENGLAND AS STUDENT10 IN LONDON 2111 PLAYING THE ENGLISH GENTLEMAN 2212 CHANGES 2513 SHYNESS MY SHIELD 2814 ACQUAINTANCE WITH RELIGIONS 28

PART III : IN INDIA AS BARRISTER15 BACK IN INDIA 3016 THE FIRST SHOCK 32

PART IV : IN SOUTH AFRICA17 ARRIVAL IN SOUTH AFRICA 3518 TO PRETORIA 3619 FIRST DAY IN PRETORIA 4220 GETTING ACQUAINTED WITH

THE INDIAN PROBLEM 4321 THE CASE 4522 MAN PROPOSES, GOD DISPOSES 4523 THE £ 3 TAX 46

PART V : VISIT TO INDIA24 IN INDIA 48

PART VI : BACK IN SOUTH AFRICA25 STORMY ARRIVAL IN SOUTH AFRICA 4926 SIMPLE LIFE 53

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27 A RECOLLECTION AND A PENANCE 5528 THE BOER WAR 5629 COSTLY GIFTS 57

PART VII : BACK IN INDIA30 MY FIRST CONGRESS 5831 IN BOMBAY 60

PART VIII : IN SOUTH AFRICA AGAIN32 IN SOUTH AFRICA AGAIN 6033 STUDY OF THE GITA 6134 THE MAGIC SPELL OF A BOOK 6235 THE PHOENIX SETTLEMENT 6336 THE ZULU REBELLION 6337 KASTURBA’S COURAGE 6438 DOMESTIC SATYAGRAHA 6639 THE ADVENT OF SATYAGRAHA 6640 IMPRISONMENT 6841 ASSAULT 6842 RESUMPTION OF SATYAGRAHA 7143 THE TRIUMPH OF SATYAGRAHA 73

PART IX : IN INDIA AND FOUNDING OF THE ASHRAM44 IN POONA 7445 FOUNDING OF THE ASHRAM 77

PART X : CHAMP ARAN46 THE STAIN OF INDIGO 7847 THE STAIN REMOVED 80

PART XI : AHMEDABAD LABOUR48 IN TOUCH WITH LABOUR 81

PART XII : THE KHEDA SATYAGRAHA49 THE KHEDA SATYAGRAHA 8250 NEAR DEATH’S DOOR 84

PART XIII : THE ROWLATT ACT AND ENTRANCE INTO POLITICS51 THE ROWLATT ACT 86

PART XIV : THE BIRTH OF KHADI52 THE BIRTH OF KHADI 8953 FAREWELL 90

TOPICS FOR ESSAYS 92

viii

“I have nothing new to teach the World.Truth and non-violence are as old as hills.”

M. K. Gandhi

A

1

My father, Karamchand Gandhi,was Prime Minister in Porbandar.He was a lover of his clan, truth-ful, brave and generous, but short-tempered.

He never had any ambition toaccumulate riches and left us verylittle property.

He had no education. At best, hemight be said to have read up tothe fifth Gujarati standard. Of his-tory and geography he was inno-cent. But his rich experience ofpractical affairs stood him in goodstead in the solution of the mostintricate questions and in managinghundreds of men. Of religioustraining he had very little, but hehad that kind of religious culturewhich frequent visits to templesand listening to religious dis-courses make available to manyHindus.

The outstanding impression mymother has left on my memory isthat of saintliness. She was deeplyreligious. She would not think oftaking her meals without her daily

prayers. Going to Haveli – theVaishnava temple – was one of herdaily duties. As far as my memorycan go back, I do not rememberher having ever missed theChaturmas. She would take thehardest vows and keep them what-ever happened. Illness was no ex-cuse for relaxing them. I can recallher once falling ill when she was

PART I : CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH

1. BIRTH AND PARENTAGE

The house at Porbandar

2

observing the Chandrayana vow,but the illness was not allowed tocome in the way of the obser-vance. To keep two or three fastsone after another was nothing toher. Living on one meal a day dur-ing Chaturmas was a habit withher. Not content with that shefasted every other day during oneChaturmas. During anotherChaturmas she vowed not to havefood without seeing the sun. Wechildren on those days wouldstand, staring at the sky, waiting toannounce the appearance of thesun to our mother. Everyoneknows that at the height of therainy season the sun often does not

show his face. And I rememberdays when, at his sudden appear-ance, we would rush and announceit to her. She would run out to seewith her own eyes, but by thattime the sun would be gone, thusdepriving her of her meal. “Thatdoes not matter,” she would saycheerfully, “God did not want meto eat today.” And then she wouldreturn to her round of duties.

My mother had strong commonsense. She was well informedabout all matters of State.

Of these parents I was born atPorbandar, otherwise known asSudamapuri, on the 2nd October1869.

2. AT SCHOOL

I passed my childhood inPorbandar. I remember havingbeen put to school. It was withsome difficulty that I got throughthe multiplication tables. I recollectnothing more of those days thanhaving learnt, in company withother boys, to call our teacher allkinds of names.

I must have been about sevenwhen my father left Porbandar forRajkot. There I was put into a pri-mary school, and I can well re-member those days. As atPorbandar, so here, there is hardlyanything to note about my studies.

From this school I went to the sub-urban school and thence to thehigh school, having alreadyreached my twelfth year. I do notremember having ever told a lie,during this short period, either tomy teachers or to my schoolmates.I used to be very shy and avoidedall company. My books and mylessons were my sole companions.To be at school at the stroke of thehour and to run back home as soonas the school closed, – that wasmy daily habit. I literally ran back,because I could not bear to talk toanybody. I was even afraid lest

3

anyone should poke fun at me.There is an incident which oc-

curred at the examination duringmy first year at the high schooland which is worth recording. Mr.Giles, the Educational Inspector,had come on a visit of inspection.He had set us five words to writeas a spelling exercise. One of thewords was ‘kettle’. I had misspeltit. The teacher tried to prompt mewith the point of his boot, but Iwould not be prompted. It was be-yond me to see that he wanted meto copy the spelling from myneighbour’s slate, for I had thoughtthat the teacher was there to super-vise us against copying. The resultwas that all the boys, except my-self, were found to have spelt ev-ery word correctly. Only I hadbeen stupid. The teacher tried laterto tell me that I should not havebeen so stupid, but without effect.I never could learn the art of‘copying’.

Yet the incident did not in theleast lessen my respect for myteacher. I was, by nature, blind tothe faults of elders. Later I came toknow of many other failings ofthis teacher, but my regard for himremained the same. For I had learntto carry out the orders of elders, not

to look critically at their actions.Two other incidents belonging to

the same period have always clungto my memory. As a rule I did notlike any reading beyond my schoolbooks. The daily lessons had to bedone, because I did not want to betaken to task by my teacher, nor todeceive him. Therefore, I would dothe lessons, but often without mymind in them. Thus when even thelessons could not be done properly,there was of course no question ofany extra reading. But somehowmy eyes fell on a book purchasedby my father. It was Shravana*Pitribhakti Nataka (a play aboutShravana’s devotion to his par-ents). I read it with intense inter-est. There came to our place aboutthe same time wandering show-men. One of the pictures I wasshown was of Shravana carrying,by means of slings fitted for hisshoulders, his blind parents on apilgrimage. The book and thepicture left a permanent impres-sion on my mind. “Here is anexample for you to copy,” I saidto myself.

Just about this time, I had se-cured my father’s permission tosee a play performed by a certaindramatic company. This play –

* Shravana, a young ascetic, was extremely devoted to his blind parents whom hecarried in a hammock for a pilgrimage. On his way he was accidentally shot dead byRama's father, King Dasharatha.

4

Harishchandra+ – captured myheart. I could never be tired of see-ing it. But how often should I bepermitted to go? I kept thinkingabout it all the time and I musthave acted Harishchandra to my-self times without number. “Whyshould not all be truthful likeHarishchandra ?” was the questionI asked myself day and night. Tofollow truth and to go through allthe ordeals Harishchandra wentthrough was the one ideal it in-spired in me. I literally believed inthe story of Harishchandra. Thethought of it all often made meweep.

I was not regarded as a dunce atthe high school. I always enjoyedthe affection of my teachers. Cer-tificates of progress and characterused to be sent to the parents ev-ery year. I never had a bad certifi-cate. In fact I even won prizes af-ter I passed out of the second stan-dard. In the fifth and sixth I ob-tained scholarships of rupees fourand ten respectively, an achieve-ment for which I have to thankgood luck more than my merit. Forthe scholarships were not open toall, but reserved for the best boys

amongst those coming from theSorath Division of Kathiawad. Andin those days there could not havebeen many boys from Sorath in aclass of forty to fifty.

My own recollection is that Ihad not any high regard for myability. I used to be astonishedwhenever I won prizes and schol-arships. But I very jealouslyguarded my character. The leastlittle fault drew tears from myeyes. When I merited, or seemedto the teacher to merit, a rebuke, itwas unbearable for me. I remem-ber having once received a beating.I did not so much mind the pun-ishment, as the fact that it wasconsidered my deserts. I wept pite-ously. That was when I was in thefirst or second standard. There wasanother such incident during thetime when I was in the seventhstandard. Dorabji Edulji Gimi wasthe headmaster then. He was popu-lar among boys, as he was a disci-plinarian, a man of method and agood teacher. He had made gym-nastics and cricket compulsory forboys of the upper standards. I dis-liked both. I never took part in anyexercise, cricket or football, before

+ Harishchandra, according to Hindu epics, was a king. He was famous for hisliberality, and unflinching adherence to truth. The celebrated sage Vishwamitra decidedto test the king and subjected him to very severe tests including compulsion to put hisown wife to death as a witch ! The king, however, stood the test with great courage andtruthfulness.

5

they were made compulsory. Myshyness was one of the reasons forthis aloofness, which I now seewas wrong. I then had the falsenotion that gymnastics had nothingto do with education.

I may mention, however, that Iwas none the worse for keepingaway from exercise. That was be-cause I had read in books aboutthe benefits of long walks in theopen air, and having liked the ad-vice, I had formed a habit of tak-ing walks, which has still remainedwith me. These walks gave me afairly hardy constitution.

The reason of my dislike forgymnastics was my keen desire toserve as nurse to my father. Assoon as the school closed, I wouldhurry home and begin serving him.Compulsory exercise came directlyin the way of this service. I re-quested Mr. Gimi to exempt mefrom gymnastics so that I might befree to serve my father. But hewould not listen to me. Now it sohappened that one Saturday, whenwe had school in the morning, Ihad to go from home to the schoolfor gymnastics at 4 o'clock in theafternoon. I had no watch, and theclouds deceived me. Before Ireached the school the boys had allleft. The next day Mr. Gimi, exam-ining the roll, found me markedabsent. Being asked the reason for

absence, I told him what had hap-pened. He refused to believe meand ordered me to pay a fine ofone or two annas (I cannot nowrecall how much).

I was convicted of lying ! Thatdeeply pained me. How was I toprove my innocence ? There wasno way. I cried in deep anguish. Isaw that a man of truth must alsobe a man of care. This was thefirst and last instance of my care-lessness in school. I have a faintrecollection that I finally succeededin getting the fine refunded. Theexemption from exercise was ofcourse obtained, as my fatherwrote himself to the headmastersaying that he wanted me at homeafter school.

But though I was none theworse for having neglected exer-cise, I am still paying the penaltyof another neglect. I do not knowwhence I got the notion that goodhandwriting was not a necessarypart of education, but I retained ituntil I went to England. Bad hand-writing should be regarded as asign of an imperfect education. Itried later to improve mine, but itwas too late. I could never repairthe neglect of my youth.

Two more incidents of myschool days are worth recording. Ihad lost one year because of mymarriage, and the teacher wanted

6

me to make good the loss by skip-ping the class – a privilege usuallyallowed to hard-working boys. Itherefore had only six months inthe third standard and was pro-moted to the fourth after the ex-aminations which are followed bythe summer vacation. Most sub-jects were taught in English fromthe fourth standard. I found it veryhard. Geometry was a new subjectin which I was not particularlystrong, and the English mediummade it still more difficult for me.The teacher taught the subject verywell but I could not follow him.Often I would lose heart and thinkof going back to the third standard,feeling that the packing of twoyears’ studies into a single yearwas too much. But this would dis-credit not only me, but also theteacher; because, counting on myability, he had recommended mypromotion. So the fear of thedouble discredit kept me at mypost. When, however, with mucheffort I reached the thirteenthproposition of Euclid, the uttersimplicity of the subject becameclear to me. A subject which onlyrequired a pure and simple use ofone’s reasoning powers could notbe difficult. Ever since that timegeometry has been both easy andinteresting for me.

Sanskrit, however, proved a

harder task. In geometry there wasnothing to memorize, whereas inSanskrit, I thought, everything hadto be learnt by heart. This subjectalso began from the fourth stan-dard. As soon as I entered thesixth I became disheartened. Theteacher was a hard task-master,anxious, as I thought, to force theboys. There was a sort of rivalrygoing on between the Sanskrit andthe Persian teachers. The Persianteacher was lenient. The boys usedto talk among themselves that Per-sian was very easy and the Persianteacher very good and considerateto the students. The ‘easiness’tempted me and one day I sat inthe Persian class. the Sanskritteacher was grieved. He called meto his side and said : “How canyou forget that you are the son of aVaishnava father ? Won't you learnthe language of your own reli-gion ? If you have any difficulty,why not come to me ? I want toteach you students Sanskrit to thebest of my ability. As you proceedfurther, you will find in it things ofgreat interest. You should not loseheart. Come and sit again in theSanskrit class.”

This kindness put me to shame.I could not disregard my teacher’saffection. If I had not acquired thelittle Sanskrit that I learnt then, Ishould have found it difficult to

7

take any interest in our sacredbooks. In fact I am sorry now thatI was not able to acquire a morethorough knowledge of the lan-

guage, because I have since real-ized that every Hindu boy and girlshould possess sound Sanskritlearning.

3. MARRIAGE

It is my painful duty to have torecord here my marriage at the ageof thirteen. As I see the youngstersof the same age about me who areunder my care, and think of myown marriage, I am inclined topity myself and to congratulatethem on having escaped my lot. Ican see no moral argument in sup-port of such early marriage.

I do not think it meant to meanything more than good clothes towear, drum beating, marriage pro-cessions, rich dinners and a strangegirl to play with. We gradually be-gan to know each other, and tospeak freely together. We were thesame age. But I took no time inassuming the authority of a hus-band.

I would not allow my wife to goanywhere without my permission.And Kasturba was not the girl toput up with any such thing. Shemade it a point to go out wheneverand wherever she liked. More re-straint on my part resulted in moreliberty being taken by her and inmy getting more and more angry.Refusal to speak to one anotherthus became the order of the day

with us, married children. I think itwas quite innocent of Kasturba notto have bothered about my restric-tions. How could an innocent girlput up with any restraint on goingto the temple or on going on visitsto friends? If I had the right torestrict her, had not she also asimilar right? All this is clear tome today. But at that time I had tomake good my authority as a hus-band !

Let not the reader think, how-ever, that ours was a life of con-stant quarrels. For my severitieswere all based on love. I wanted tomake my wife an ideal wife. Myambition was to make her live apure life, learn what I learnt, andidentify her life and thought withmine.

I do not think Kasturba had anysuch desire. She did not know toread or write. By nature she wassimple, independent, perseveringand, with me at least, shy. She wasnot impatient of her ignorance andI do not recollect my studies hav-ing ever made her want to go infor studies herself.

8

4. A TRAGIC FRIENDSHIP

Amongst my few friends at thehigh school I had, at differenttimes, two who might be called in-timate. One of these friendshipsdid not last long, though I nevergave up my friend. He gave meup, because I made friends withthe other. This latter friendship Iregard as a tragedy in my life. Itlasted long. I formed it in the spiritof a reformer.

This companion was originallymy elder brother’s friend. Theywere classmates. I knew his weak-nesses, but I regarded him as afaithful friend. My mother, my el-dest brother, and my wife warnedme that I was in bad company. I

was too proud to heed my wife’swarning. But I dared not goagainst the opinion of my motherand my eldest brother. Neverthe-less I pleaded with them saying, “Iknow he has the weakness you at-tribute to him but you do not knowhis virtues. He cannot lead meastray, as my association with himis meant to reform him. For I amsure that if he reforms his ways, hewill be a splendid man. I beg younot to be anxious on my account.”

I do not think this satisfiedthem, but they accepted my expla-nation and let me go my way.

A wave of ‘reform’ was sweep-ing over Rajkot at the time when Ifirst came across this friend. Heinformed me that many of ourteachers were secretly taking meatand wine. He also named manywell-known people of Rajkot asbelonging to the same company.There were also, I was told, somehighschool boys among them.

I was surprised and pained. Iasked my friend the reason and heexplained it thus: “We are a weakpeople because we do not eatmeat. The English are able to ruleover us, because they are meat-eat-ers. You know how hardy I am,and how great a runner too. It isbecause I am a meat-eater. Meat-With a friend

9

eaters do not have boils, and evenif they sometimes happen to haveany, these heal quickly. Our teach-ers and other distinguished peoplewho eat meat are no fools. Theyknow its virtues. You should dolikewise. There is nothing like try-ing. Try, and see what strength itgives.”

All these pleas on behalf ofmeat-eating were not made at asingle sitting. They represent thesubstance of a long and elaborateargument which my friend was try-ing to impress upon me from timeto time. My elder brother had al-ready fallen. He therefore sup-ported my friend’s argument. I cer-tainly looked feeble-bodied by theside of my brother and this friend.They were both hardier, physicallystronger, and more daring. Thisfriend’s exploits cast a spell overme. He could run long distancesand extraordinarily fast. He was anadept in high and long jumping.He could put up with any amountof physical punishment. He wouldoften display his exploits to meand, as one is always dazzledwhen he sees in others the quali-ties that he lacks himself, I wasdazzled by this friend’s exploits.This was followed by a strong de-sire to be like him. I could hardlyjump or run. Why should not Ialso be as strong as he ?

Moreover, I was a coward. Iused to be afraid of thieves, ghostsand serpents. I did not dare to stirout of doors at night. Darknesswas a terror to me. It was almostimpossible for me to sleep in thedark, as I would imagine ghostscoming from one direction, thievesfrom another and serpents from athird. I could not therefore bear tosleep without a light in the room.My friend knew all these weak-nesses of mine. He would tell methat he could hold in his hand liveserpents, could defy thieves anddid not believe in ghosts.

All these had its due effect onme. I was beaten. It began to growon me that meat-eating was good,that it would make me strong anddaring, and that, if the whole coun-try took to meat-eating, the Englishcould be overcome.

A day was thereupon fixed forbeginning the experiment. It had tobe done in secret as my parentswere orthodox Vaishnavas, and Iwas extremely devoted to them. Icannot say that I did not knowthen that I should have to deceivemy parents if I began eating meat.But my mind was bent on the ‘re-form’. It was not a question ofhaving something tasty to eat. I didnot know that it had a particularlygood taste. I wished to be strongand daring and wanted my coun-

10

trymen also to be such. The zealfor the ‘reform’ blinded me. Andhaving ensured secrecy, I per-suaded myself that mere hiding thedeed from parents was no depar-ture from truth.

So the day came. We went insearch of a lonely spot by theriver, and there I saw, for the firsttime in my life, meat. There wasbaker's bread also. I did not likeeither. The goat's meat was astough as leather. I simply could noteat it. I was sick and had to leaveoff eating.

I had a very bad night after-wards. A horrible dream hauntedme. Every time I dropped off tosleep it would seem as though alive goat were crying inside me,and I would jump up sorry forwhat I had done. But then I wouldremind myself that meat-eatingwas a duty and so become morecheerful.

My friend was not a man togive in easily. He now began tocook various delicacies with meat.And for dining, no longer was thequiet spot on the river chosen, buta State house, with its dining halland tables and chairs, about whichmy friend had made arrangementswith the chief cook there.

Gradually I got over my dislikefor bread, gave up my pity for thegoats, and began to enjoy meat-

dishes, if not meat itself. Thiswent on for about a year. But notmore than half a dozen meat-feastswere enjoyed in all. I had nomoney to pay for this ‘reform’. Myfriend had therefore always to findthe money. I had no knowledgewhere he found it. But find it hedid, because he was bent on turn-ing me into a meat-eater. But evenhis means must have been limited,and hence these feasts had neces-sarily to be few and far between.

Whenever I had occasion to in-dulge in these secret feasts, eatingat home was impossible. Mymother would naturally ask me tocome and take my food and wantto know the reason why I did notwish to eat. I would say to her, “Ihave no appetite today; there issomething wrong with my diges-tion.” I knew I was lying, and ly-ing to my mother. I also knew that,if my mother and father came toknow of my having become ameat-eater, they would be deeplyshocked. This knowledge wasmaking me feel uneasy.

Therefore I said to myself :“Though it is essential to eat meat,and also essential to take up food‘reform’ in the country, yet deceiv-ing and lying to one’s father andmother is worse than not eatingmeat. In their lifetime, therefore,meat-eating must be given up.

11

When they are no more and I havefound my freedom, I will eat meatopenly, but until that moment ar-rives I will keep away from it.”

This decision I told to myfriend, and I have never since goneback to meat.

5. STEALING

I have still to relate some of myfailings during this meat-eating pe-riod and also previous to it, whichdate from before my marriage orsoon after.

A relative and I became fond ofsmoking. Not that we saw anygood in smoking, or liked thesmell of a cigarette. We simplyimagined a sort of pleasure insending out clouds of smoke fromour mouths. My uncle had thehabit, and we should copy his ex-ample. But we had no money. Sowe began stealing stumps of ciga-rettes thrown away by my uncle.

The stumps, however, were notalways available, and could notgive out much smoke either. So webegan to steal coppers from theservant’s pocket-money in order topurchase Indian cigarettes. But thequestion was where to keep them.We could not of course smoke inthe presence of elders. We man-aged somehow for a few weeks onthese stolen coppers. In the mean-time we heard that the stalks of acertain plant could be smoked likecigarettes. We got them and began

this kind of smoking.But we were far from being sat-

isfied with such things as these.Our want of independence beganto be painful. It was unbearablethat we should be unable to doanything without the elders’ per-mission. At last, in sheer disgust,we decided to commit suicide !

But how were we to do it? Fromwhere were we to get the poison?We heard that dhatura seeds werean effective poison. Off we went tothe jungle in search of these seedsand got them. Evening was thoughtto be the auspicious hour. We wentto Kedarji Mandir, put ghee in thetemple-lamp, had the darshan andthen looked for a lonely corner. Butour courage failed us. Supposing wewere not at once killed ? And whatwas the good of killing ourselves ?Why not rather put up with the lackof independence ? But we swal-lowed two or three seeds neverthe-less. We dared not take more. Bothof us did not like to die, and decidedto go to Ramji Mandir to calm our-selves, and to dismiss the thought ofsuicide.

12

I realized that it was not easy tocommit suicide.

The thought of suicide ulti-mately resulted in both of us bid-ding goodbye to the habit of smok-ing and of stealing the servant’scoppers for the purpose.

Ever since I have grown up, Ihave never desired to smoke andhave always regarded the habit ofsmoking as barbarous, dirty andharmful. I have never understoodwhy there is such a desire forsmoking throughout the world. Icannot bear to travel in a compart-ment full of people smoking. I be-come choked.

But much more serious than thistheft was the one I was guilty of alittle later. I stole the coppers whenI was twelve or thirteen, possiblyless. The other theft was commit-ted when I was fifteen. In this caseI stole a bit of gold out of mymeat-eating brother’s armlet. Thisbrother had run into a debt ofabout twenty-five rupees. He hadon his arm an armlet of solid gold.It was not difficult to clip a bit outof it.

Well, it was done, and the debtcleared. But this became more thanI could bear. I resolved never tosteal again. I also made up mymind to confess it to my father.But I did not dare to speak. Notthat I was afraid of my father beat-

ing me. No. I do not recall his everhaving beaten any of us. I wasafraid of the pain that I shouldcause him. But I felt that the riskshould be taken; that there couldnot be cleansing without a cleanconfession.

I decided at last to write out theconfession to submit it to my fa-ther, and ask his forgiveness. Iwrote it on a slip of paper andhanded it to him myself. In thisnote not only did I confess myguilt, but I asked adequate punish-ment for it, and closed with a re-quest to him not to punish himselffor my offence. I also pledged my-self never to steal in future.

I was trembling as I handed theconfession to my father. He wasthen confined to bed. His bed wasa plain wooden plank. I handedhim the note and sat opposite theplank.

He read it through, and tearstrickled down his cheeks, wettingthe paper. For a moment he closedhis eyes in thought and then toreup the note. He had sat up to readit. He again lay down. I also cried.I could see my father’s agony. If Iwere a painter I could draw a pic-ture of the whole scene today. It isstill so vivid in my mind.

Those tears of love cleansed myheart, and washed my sin away.Only he who has experienced such

13

love can know what it is.This sort of forgiveness was not

natural to my father. I had thoughtthat he would be angry, say hardthings, and strike his forehead. Buthe was so wonderfully peaceful,and I believe this was due to myclean confession. A clean confes-sion, combined with a promise

never to commit the sin again,when offered before one who hasthe right to receive it, is the puresttype of repentance. I know that myconfession made my father feel ab-solutely safe about me, and in-creased greatly his affection forme.

6. MY FATHER’S ILLNESS AND DEATH

The time of which I am nowspeaking is my sixteenth year. Myfather, as we have seen, was bed-ridden. My mother, an old servantof the house, and I were attendingon him. I had the duties of a nurse,which mainly consisted in dressing

the wound, and giving my fatherhis medicine. Every night I mas-saged his legs and retired onlywhen he asked me to do so or af-ter he had fallen asleep. I loved todo this service. I do not rememberever having neglected it. All thetime at my disposal, after the per-formance of the daily duties, wasdivided between school and attend-ing on my father. I would only goout for an evening walk eitherwhen he permitted me or when hewas feeling well.

The dreadful night came. It was10-30 or 11 p.m. I was giving themassage. My uncle offered to re-lieve me. I was glad and wentstraight to bed. In five or six min-utes, however, the servant knockedat the door. I started with alarm.“Get up,” he said. “Father is veryill.” I knew of course that he wasvery ill, and so I guessed what‘very ill’ meant at that moment. IFather Karamchand

14

sprang out of bed.“What is the matter ? Do tell

me !”“Father is no more.”

So all was over! I felt very un-happy that I was not near my fa-ther when he died.

7. GLIMPSES OF RELIGION

I have said before that there wasin me a fear of ghosts and spirits.Rambha, my nurse, suggested, as aremedy for this fear, the repetitionof Ramanama or name of God. Ihad more faith in her than in herremedy, and so at a very early agebegan repeating Ramanama to curemy fear of ghosts and spirits. Thiswas of course short-lived, but thegood seed sown in childhood wasnot sown in vain. I think it is dueto the seed sown by that goodwoman Rambha that todayRamanama is a never failing rem-edy for me.

During part of his illness my fa-ther was in Porbandar. There everyevening he used to listen to theRamayana. The reader was a greatdevotee of Rama. He had a goodvoice. He would sing the versesand explain them, losing himself inthe story and carrying his listenersalong with him. I must have beenthirteen at that time, but I quiteremember being quite taken up byhis reading. That laid the founda-tion of my deep devotion to theRamayana. Today I regard the

Ramayana of Tulsidas as the great-est book in all religious literature.

In Rajkot I learnt to be friendlyto all branches of Hinduism andsister religions. For my father andmother would visit the Haveli asalso Shiva's and Rama's temples,and would take or send us young-sters there. Jain monks also wouldpay frequent visits to my father,and would even go out of theirway to accept food from us – non-Jains. They would have talks withmy father on subjects religious andworldly.

He had besides, Mussalman andParsi friends, who would talk tohim about their own faiths, and hewould listen to them always withrespect, and often with interest.Being his nurse, I often had achance to be present at these talks.These many things combined toteach me toleration for all faiths.

Only Christianity was at thetime an exception. I developed asort of dislike for it. And for areason. In those days Christianmissionaries used to stand in a cor-ner near the high school and

15

preach against Hindus and theirgods. I could not endure this.About the same time, I heard of awell-known Hindu having beenconverted to Christianity. It wasthe talk of the town that when hewas baptized, he had to eat beefand drink liquor, that he also hadto change his clothes, and thatfrom then on he began to go aboutin European costume including ahat. I also heard that the new con-vert had already begun abusing thereligion of his ancestors, their cus-toms and their country. All thesethings made me dislike Christian-ity.

But the fact that I had learnt tobe tolerant to other religions didnot mean that I had any livingfaith in God. But one thing tookdeep root in me – the convictionthat morality is the basis of thingsand that truth is the substance of

all morality.A Gujarati verse likewise

gripped my mind and heart. Itsteaching – return good for evil –became my guiding principle. Itbecame such a passion with methat I began numerous experimentsin it. Here are those (for me) won-derful lines :

For a bowl of water give a goodly

meal;

For a kindly greeting bow thou down

with zeal;

For a simple penny pay thou back with

gold;

If thy life be rescued, life do not with-

hold.

Thus the words and actions of the wise

regard;

Every little service tenfold they reward.

But the truly noble know all men as

one

And return with gladness good for evil

done.

8. PREPARATION FOR ENGLAND

My elders wanted me to con-tinue my studies at college afterschool. There was a college inBhavnagar as well as in Bombay,and as the former was cheaper, Idecided to go there and join theSamaldas College. I went, butfound everything very difficult. Atthe end of the first term, I returnedhome.

We had in Mavji Dave, whowas a shrewd and learned Brah-man, an old friend and adviser ofthe family. He had kept up hisconnection with the family evenafter my father's death. He hap-pened to visit us during my holi-days. In conversation with mymother and elder brother, he in-quired about my studies. Learning

16

that I was at Samaldas College, hesaid: “The times are changed. Andnone of you can expect to succeedto your father’s gadi (officialwork) without having had a propereducation. Now as this boy is stillpursuing his studies, you should alllook to him to keep the gadi. Itwill take him four or five years toget his B. A. degree, which will atbest qualify him for a sixty rupees’post, not for a Diwanship. If likemy son he went in for law, itwould take him still longer, bywhich time there would be a hostof lawyers aspiring for a Diwan'spost. I would far rather that yousent him to England. Think of thatbarrister who has just come backfrom England. How stylishly helives ! He could get the Diwanshipfor the asking. I would stronglyadvise you to send Mohandas toEngland this very year. Kevalramhas numerous friends in England.He will give notes of introductionto them, and Mohandas will havean easy time of it there.”

Joshiji – that is how we used tocall old Mavji Dave – turned tome and asked : “Would you notrather go to England than studyhere ?” Nothing could have beenmore welcome to me. I was find-ing my studies difficult. So Ijumped at the proposal and saidthat the sooner I was sent the bet-

ter. My elder brother was greatlytroubled in his mind. How was heto find the money to send me?And was it proper to trust a youngman like me to go abroad alone?My mother was very worried. Shedid not like the idea of partingwith me. She had begun makingminute inquiries. Someone hadtold her that young men got lost inEngland. Someone else had saidthat they took to meat; and yet an-other that they could not live therewithout liquor. “How about allthis ?” she asked me. I said : “Willyou not trust me? I shall not lie toyou. I promise that I shall nottouch any of those things. If therewere any such danger, wouldJoshiji let me go ?”

“I can trust you,” she said. “Buthow can I trust you in a distantland? I am confused and know notwhat to do. I will ask BecharjiSwami.”

Becharji Swami was originally aModh Bania, but had now becomea Jain monk. He too was a familyadviser like Joshiji. He came tomy help, and said : “I shall get theboy solemnly to take the threevows, and then he can be allowedto go.” I vowed not to touch wine,woman and meat. This done, mymother gave her permission.

The high school had a send-offin my honour. It was an uncom-

17

mon thing for a young man ofRajkot to go to England. I hadwritten out a few words of thanks.But I could scarcely read them out.I remember how my head reeledand how my whole frame shook asI stood up to read them.

With my mother’s permissionand blessings, I set off happily forBombay, leaving my wife with ababy of a few months. But on ar-rival there friends told my brotherthat the Indian Ocean was rough inJune and July, and as this was myfirst voyage, I should not be al-lowed to sail until November.

Meanwhile my caste-peoplewere agitated over my goingabroad. A general meeting of thecaste was called and I was sum-moned to appear before it. I went.How I suddenly managed to gatherup courage I do not know. Fear-less, and without the slightest hesi-tation, I came before the meeting.The Sheth – the headman of thecommunity – who was distantly re-lated to me and had been on verygood terms with my father, thusspoke to me :

“In the opinion of the caste yourproposal to go to England is notproper. Our religion forbids voyagesabroad. We have also heard that it isnot possible to live there and keep toour religion. One is obliged to eatand drink with Europeans !”

To which I replied : “I do notthink it is at all against our reli-gion to go to England. I intend go-ing there for further studies. And Ihave already solemnly promised tomy mother to keep away fromthree things you fear most. I amsure the vow will keep me safe.”

“But we tell you,” replied theSheth, “that it is not possible tokeep our religion there. You knowmy relations with your father andyou ought to listen to my advice.”

“I know those relations”, said I.“And you are as an elder to me.But I am helpless in this matter. Icannot change my decision to goto England. My father’s friend andadviser who is a learned Brahmansees no objection to my going toEngland, and my mother andbrother have also given me theirpermission.”

“But will you disregard the or-ders of the caste ?”

“I am really helpless. I think thecaste should not interfere in thematter.”

This made the Sheth very angry.He swore at me. I sat unmoved. Sothe Sheth ordered : “This boy shallbe treated as an outcaste from to-day. Whoever helps him or goes tosee him off at dock shall be pun-ishable with a fine of one rupeefour annas.”

The order had no effect on me,

18

and I took my leave of the Sheth.But I wondered how my brotherwould take it. Fortunately he re-mained firm and wrote to assureme that I had his permission to go,in spite of the Sheth's order.

A berth was reserved for me bymy friends in the same cabin asthat of Shri TryambakraiMazmudar, the Junagadh Vakil.

They also asked him to help me.He was an experienced man ofmature age and knew the world. Iwas yet a youth of eighteen with-out any experience of the world.Shri Mazmudar told my friends notto worry about me.

I sailed at last from Bombay onthe 4th of September.

9. ON BOARD THE SHIP

I was not used to talking En-glish, and except for ShriMazmudar all the other passengersin the second saloon were English.I could not speak to them. For Icould rarely follow their remarkswhen they came up to speak tome, and even when I understood Icould not reply. I had to frame ev-ery sentence in my mind before Icould bring it out. I was innocentof the use of knives and forks andhad not the boldness to inquirewhat dishes on the menu were freeof meat. I therefore never tookmeals at table but always had themin my cabin, and they consistedprincipally of sweets and fruitswhich I had brought with me. ShriMazmudar had no difficulty, andhe mixed with everybody. Hewould move about freely on deck,while I hid myself in the cabin thewhole day, only going up on deck

when there were but few people.Shri Mazmudar kept pleading withme to associate with the passen-gers and to talk with them freely.He told me that lawyers shouldhave a long tongue, and related tome his legal experience. He ad-vised me to take every possibleopportunity of talking English andnot to mind making mistakeswhich were obviously unavoidablewith a foreign tongue. But nothingcould make me conquer my shy-ness.

An English passenger, wantingto be nice to me, drew me intoconversation. He was older than I.He asked me what I ate, what Iwas, where I was going, why I wasshy, and so on. He also advised meto come to table. He laughed at myinsistence on not eating meat, andsaid in a friendly way when wewere in the Red Sea : “It is all

19

very well so far but you will haveto change your decision in the Bayof Biscay. And it is so cold in En-gland that one cannot possibly livethere without meat.”

“But I have heard that peoplecan live there without eatingmeat,” I said.

“Rest assured it is a lie,” saidhe. “No one, to my knowledge,lives there without being a meat-eater. Don’t you see that I am notasking you to take liquor, though Ido so? But I do think you shouldeat meat, for you cannot live with-out it.”

“I thank you for your kind ad-vice, but I have solemnly promisedto my mother not to touch meat,and therefore I cannot think of tak-ing it. If it be found impossible toget on without it, I will far rathergo back to India than eat meat inorder to remain there.”

We entered the Bay of Biscay,but I did not begin to feel the needeither of meat or liquor. Wereached Southampton, as far as Iremember, on a Saturday. On theboat I had worn a black suit, thewhite flannel one, which myfriends had got me, having beenkept especially for wearing when Ilanded. I had thought that whiteclothes would suit me better whenI stepped ashore, and therefore, Idid so in white flannels. Those

were the last days of September,and I found I was the only personwearing such clothes. I left incharge of an agent of Grindlay andCo. all my luggage including thekeys, seeing that many others haddone the same and I thought Imust do like them.

Someone on board had advisedus to put up at the Victoria Hotelin London. Shri Mazmudar and Iaccordingly went there. The shameof being the only person in whiteclothes was already too much forme. And when at the Hotel I wastold that I should not get my thingsfrom Grindlay’s the next day, it be-ing a Sunday, I felt very bad.

Dr. Mehta to whom I had wiredfrom Southampton, called at abouteight o’clock the same evening. Hegave me a hearty greeting. Hesmiled at my being in white flan-nels. As we were talking, I casu-ally picked up his top-hat, and try-ing to see how smooth it was,passed my hand over it the wrongway and disturbed the fur. Dr.Mehta looked somewhat angrily atwhat I was doing and stopped me.But the mischief had been done.The incident was a warning for thefuture, and Dr. Mehta gave me myfirst lesson in European etiquette.“Do not touch other people’sthings,” he said. “Do not ask ques-tions as we usually do in India on

20

first acquaintance; do not talkloudly; never address people as‘sir’ whilst speaking to them as wedo in India; only servants and sub-ordinates address their masters thatway.'' And so on and so forth. Healso told me that it was very ex-pensive to live in a hotel and re-commended that I should live witha private family.

Shri Mazmudar and I found thehotel to be a trying affair. It wasalso very expensive. There was,however, a Sindhi fellow-passengerfrom Malta who had becomefriends with Shri Mazmudar, andas he was not a stranger to Lon-don, he offered to find rooms forus. We agreed, and on Monday, assoon as we got our baggage, wepaid up our bills and went to therooms rented for us by the Sindhifriend. I remember my hotel billcame to £ 3, an amount whichshocked me. And I had practicallystarved in spite of this heavy bill!For I could relish nothing. When Idid not like one thing, I asked foranother, but had to pay for bothjust the same. The fact is that all

this while I had depended on thefoodstuffs which I had broughtwith me from Bombay.

I was very uneasy even in thenew rooms. I would continuallythink of my home and country, andof my mother’s love. At night thetears would stream down mycheeks, and home memories of allsorts made sleep out of the ques-tion. It was impossible to share mymisery with anyone. And even if Icould have done so, where was theuse? I knew of nothing that wouldsoothe me. Everything was strange– the people, their ways, and eventheir dwellings. I was a completestranger to English etiquette andcontinually had to be on my guard.There was the additional inconve-nience of the vegetarian vow. Eventhe dishes that I could eat weretasteless. I thus found myself be-tween Scylla and Charybdis*. En-gland I could not bear, but to re-turn to India was not to be thoughtof. Now that I had come, I mustfinish the three years, said the in-ner voice.

* Scylla is a monster, according to Greek legend, living on the Italian side of theStraits of Messina, and opposite to it is Charybdis, a whirlpool. So the phrase means,being faced with two equally unpleasant alternatives. - Ed.

21

PART II : IN ENGLAND AS STUDENT

10. IN LONDON

riod with –. I will take you there.”I gratefully accepted the sugges-

tion and removed to the friend’srooms. He was all kindness andattention. He treated me as hisown brother, initiated me into En-glish ways and manners, and ac-customed me to talking the lan-guage. My food, however, becamea serious question. I could not rel-ish boiled vegetables cooked with-out salt or spices. The landladywas at a loss to know what to pre-pare for me. We had oatmeal por-ridge for breakfast, which wasfairly filling, but always I starvedat lunch and dinner. The friendcontinually reasoned with me toeat meat, but I always pleaded myvow and then remained silent.Both for luncheon and dinner wehad spinach and bread and jamtoo. I was a good eater and had abig appetite; but I was ashamed toask for more than two or threeslices of bread, as it did not seemcorrect to do so. Added to this,there was no milk either for lunchor dinner. The friend once got dis-gusted with this state of things,and said : “Had you been my ownbrother, I would have sent youaway. What is the value of a vow

Dr. Mehta went on Monday tothe Victoria Hotel expecting tofind me there. He discovered thatwe had left, got our new address,and met me at our rooms. Dr.Mehta inspected my room and itsfurniture and shook his head indisapproval. “This place won’tdo,” he said. “We come to Englandnot so much for the purpose ofstudies as for gaining experienceof English life and customs. Andfor this you need to live with afamily. But before you do so, Ithink you had better be for a pe-

In London, as a Bar Student

22

made before an illiterate motherand in ignorance of conditionshere? It is no vow at all. It wouldnot be regarded as a vow in law. Itis pure superstition to stick to sucha promise. And I tell you this per-sistence will not help you to gainanything here. You confess to hav-ing eaten and liked meat. You tookit where it was absolutely unneces-sary, and will not where it is quiteessential. What a pity !”

But I was unyielding.Day in and day out the friend

would argue, but I had an eternalno to face him with. The more heargued, the firmer I became. DailyI would pray for God’s protectionand get it. Not that I had any ideaof God. It was faith that was atwork – faith of which the seed hadbeen sown by the good nurseRambha.

I had not yet started upon regu-lar studies. In India I had neverread a newspaper. But here I suc-ceeded in cultivating a liking forthem by regular reading. This took

me hardly an hour. I therefore be-gan to wander about. I went out insearch of a vegetarian restaurant. Ihit on one in Farringdon Street.The sight of it filled me with thesame joy that a child feels on get-ting a thing after its own heart.Before I entered I noticed booksfor sale exhibited under a glasswindow near the door. I sawamong them Salt’s Plea For Veg-etarianism. This I purchased for ashilling and went straight to thedining room. This was my firsthearty meal since my arrival inEngland. God had come to my aid.

I read Salt’s book from cover tocover and was very much im-pressed by it. From the date ofreading this book, I may claim tohave become a vegetarian bychoice. I blessed the day on whichI had taken the vow before mymother. The choice was now madein favour of vegetarianism, thespread of which henceforward be-came my mission.

11. PLAYING THE ENGLISH GENTLEMAN

Meanwhile my friend had notceased to worry about me. He oneday invited me to go to the theatre.Before the play we were to dinetogether at the Holborn Restaurant.The friend had planned to take me

to this restaurant evidently imagin-ing that modesty would prevent mefrom asking any questions. And itwas a very big company of dinersin the midst of which my friendand I sat sharing a table between

23

us. The first course was soup. Iwondered what it might be madeof, but did not dare ask the friendabout it. I therefore summoned thewaiter. My friend saw the move-ment and sternly asked across thetable what was the matter. Withconsiderable hesitation I told himthat I wanted to inquire if the soupwas a vegetable soup. “You are tooclumsy for decent society,” he an-grily exclaimed. “If you cannot be-have yourself, you had better go.Feed in some other restaurant andawait me outside.” This delightedme. Out I went. There was a veg-etarian restaurant close by, but itwas closed. So I went withoutfood that night. I accompanied myfriend to the theatre, but he neversaid a word about the scene I hadcreated. On my part of coursethere was nothing to say.

That was the last friendly quar-rel we had. It did not affect ourrelations in the least. I could seeand appreciate the love underlyingall my friend’s efforts, and my re-spect for him was all the greateron account of our differences inthought and action.

But I decided that I should puthim at ease, that I should assurehim that I would be clumsy nomore, but try to become polishedand make up for my vegetarianismby cultivating other accomplish-

ments which fitted one for politesociety. And for this purpose I un-dertook the all too impossible taskof becoming an English gentleman.

The clothes after the Bombaycut that I was wearing were, Ithought, unsuitable for English so-ciety, and I got new ones at theArmy and Navy Stores. I also wentin for a chimney-pot hat costingnineteen shillings – an excessiveprice in those days. Not contentwith this, I wasted ten pounds onan evening suit made in BondStreet, the centre of fashionablelife in London; and got my goodand noble-hearted brother to sendme a double watch chain of gold.It was not correct to wear a ready-made tie and I learnt the art oftying one for myself. While in In-dia the mirror had been a luxurypermitted on the days when thefamily barber gave me a shave.Here I wasted ten minutes everyday before a huge mirror, watchingmyself arranging my tie and part-ing my hair in the correct fashion.My hair was by no means soft, andevery day it meant a regularstruggle with the brush to keep itin position. Each time the hat wasput on and off, the hand wouldautomatically move towards thehead to adjust the hair, not to men-tion the other civilized habit of thehand every now and then doing the

24

same thing when sitting in pol-ished society.

As if all this were not enough tomake me look the thing, I directedmy attention to other details thatwere supposed to go towards themaking of an English gentleman. Iwas told it was necessary for meto take lessons in dancing, French,and elocution or speechmaking.French was not only the languageof neighbouring France, but it wasa language understood all over Eu-rope where I had a desire to travel.I decided to take dancing lessonsat a class and paid down £ 3 asfees for a term. I must have takenabout six lessons in three weeks.But it was beyond me to achieveanything like rhythmic motion. Icould not follow the piano andhence found it impossible to keeptime. What then was I to do? Therecluse in the fable kept a cat tokeep off the rats, and then a cowto feed the cat with milk, and aman to keep the cow and so on.My ambitions also grew like thefamily of the recluse. I thought Ishould learn to play the violin inorder to cultivate an ear for West-ern music. So I invested £ 3 in aviolin and something more in fees.I sought a third teacher to give melessons in elocution and paid hima preliminary fee of a guinea. Herecommended Bell’s Standard

Elocutionist as the textbook, whichI purchased. And I began with aspeech of Pitt’s.

But soon I began to ask myselfwhat the purpose of all this was.

I had not to spend a lifetime inEngland, I said to myself. Whatthen was the use of learning elocu-tion? And how could dancingmake a gentleman of me? The vio-lin I could learn even in India. Iwas a student and ought to go onwith my studies. I should qualifymyself to become a barrister. If mycharacter made a gentleman of me,so much the better. Otherwise Ishould give up the ambition.

These and similar thoughts pos-sessed me, and I expressed them ina letter which I addressed to theelocution teacher, requesting himto excuse me from further lessons.I had taken only two or three. Iwrote a similar letter to the danc-ing teacher, and went personally tothe violin teacher with a request todispose of the violin for any priceit might fetch. She was ratherfriendly to me, so I told her how Ihad discovered that I was pursuinga false idea. She encouraged me inmy decision to make a completechange.

This infatuation must have lastedabout three months. Being particularabout dress persisted for years. Buthenceforward I became a student.

25

12. CHANGES

Let no one imagine that my ex-periments in dancing and the likemarked a stage of indulgence inmy life. The reader will have no-ticed that even then I knew what Iwas doing and my expenses werecarefully calculated.

As I kept strict watch over myway of living, I could see that itwas necessary to economize. So Idecided to take rooms on my ownaccount, instead of living anylonger in a family, and also to re-move from place to place accord-ing to the work I had to do, thusgaining expereince at the sametime. The rooms were so selectedas to enable me to reach the placeof business on foot in half an hour,and so save fares. Before this I hadalways taken some kind of convey-ance whenever I went anywhere,and had to find extra time forwalks. The new arrangement com-bined walks and economy, as itmeant a saving of fares and gaveme walks of eight or ten miles aday. It was mainly this habit oflong walks that kept me practicallyfree from illness throughout mystay in England and gave me afairly strong body.

Thus I rented a suite of rooms;one for a sitting room and anotherfor a bedroom. This was the sec-

ond stage. The third was yet tocome.

These changes saved me half theexpenses. But how was I to utilizethe time? I knew that Bar examina-tions did not require much study,and I therefore did not feel pressedfor time. My weak English was aperpetual worry to me. I should, Ithought, not only be called to theBar, but have some literary degreeas well. I inquired about the Ox-ford and Cambridge Universitycourses, consulted a few friends,and found that, if I elected to go toeither of these places, that wouldmean greater expense and a muchlonger stay in England than I wasprepared for. A friend suggestedthat, if I really wanted to have thesatisfaction of taking a difficult ex-amination, I should pass the Lon-don Matriculation. It meant a gooddeal of labour and much additionto my stock of general knowledge,without any extra expense worththe name. I welcomed the sugges-tion. But the syllabus frightenedme. Latin and a modern languagewere compulsory ! How was I tomanage Latin? But the friend en-tered a strong plea for it : “Latin isvery valuable to lawyers. Knowl-edge of Latin is very useful in un-derstanding law-books. And one

26

paper in Roman Law is entirely inLatin. Besides a knowledge ofLatin means greater command overthe English Language.” This ap-pealed to me and I decided to learnLatin, no matter how difficult itmight be. French I had already be-gun, so I thought that should be themodern language. I joined a privateMatriculation class. Examinationswere held every six months and Ihad only five months at my dis-posal. It was an almost impossibletask for me. I converted myselfinto a serious student. I framed myown timetable to the minute; butneither my intelligence normemory promised to enable me totackle Latin and French besidesother subjects within the given pe-riod. The result was that I failed inLatin. I was sorry but did not loseheart. I had acquired a taste forLatin; also I thought my Frenchwould be all the better for anothertrial and I would select a new sub-ject in the science group. Chemis-try which was my subject in sci-ence had no attraction for want ofexperiments, whereas it ought tohave been a deeply interestingstudy. It was one of the compulsorysubjects in India and so I had se-lected it for the London Matricula-tion. This time, however, I choseHeat and Light instead of Chemis-try. It was said to be easy and I

found it to be so.With my preparation for another

trial, I made an effort to simplifymy life still further. I felt that myway of living was still beyond themodest means of my family. Thethought of my struggling brother,who nobly responded to my regularcalls for monetary help, deeplypained me. I saw that most of thosewho were spending from eight tofifteen pounds monthly had the ad-vantage of scholarships. I had be-fore me examples of much simplerliving. I came across a fair numberof poor students living more hum-bly than I. One of them was stay-ing in the slums in a room at twoshillings a week and living on twopence worth of cocoa and breadper meal from Lockhart’s cheapCocoa Rooms. It was far from meto think of copying him, but I felt Icould surely have one room insteadof two and cook some of my mealsat home. That would be a saving offour to five pounds each month. Ialso came across books on simpleliving. I gave up the suite of roomsand rented one instead, invested ina stove, and began cooking mybreak-fast at home. The processscarcely took me more than twentyminutes for there was only oatmealporridge to cook and water to boilfor cocoa. I had lunch out, and fordinner bread and cocoa at home.

27

Thus I managed to live on a shil-ling and three pence a day. Thiswas also a period of intensivestudy. Plain living saved me plentyof time and I passed my examina-tion.

Let not the reader think that thisliving made my life by any meansa dreary affair. On the contrary thechange suited me beautifully. Itwas also more in keeping with themeans of my family. My life wascertainly more truthful and my soulknew no bounds of joy.

As soon as, or even before, Imade alterations in my expensesand my way of living, I began tomake changes in my diet. I stoppedtaking the sweets and spices I hadgot from home. The mind havingtaken a different turn, the fondnessfor spices wore away, and I nowrelished the boiled spinach whichin Richmond tasted insipid, cookedwithout spices. Many such experi-ments taught me that taste de-pended much on one’s attitude ofmind rather than on the tongue.

The economic consideration wasof course constantly before me.There was in those days a body ofopinion which regarded tea andcoffee as harmful and favoured co-coa. And as I was convinced thatone should eat only articles thatnourished the body, I gave up teaand coffee as a rule and took cocoa

instead.There were many minor experi-

ments going on along with themain one : as for example, givingup starchy foods at one time, livingon bread and fruit alone at another,and once living on cheese, milkand eggs. This last experiment isworth noting. It lasted not even afortnight. The reformer who advo-cated starchless food had spokenhighly of eggs and held that eggswere not meat. It was apparent thatthere was no injury done to livingcreatures in taking eggs. So I tookeggs in spite of my vow. But thelapse was momentary. I had nobusiness to put a new interpretationon the vow. The interpretation ofmy mother who administered thevow was there for me. I knew thather definition of meat includedeggs. And as soon as I saw the trueimport of the vow I gave up eggsand the experiment alike.

Full of a new convert’s zeal forvegetarianism, I decided to start avegetarian club in my locality. Theclub went well for a while, butcame to an end in the course of afew months. For I left the locality,according to my custom of movingfrom place to place periodically.But this brief and modest experi-ence gave me some little trainingin organizing and conducting insti-tutions.

28

13. SHYNESS MY SHIELD

I was elected to the ExecutiveCommittee of the Vegetarian Soci-ety, and made it a point to attendevery one of its meetings, but Ialways felt tongue-tied. It was onlyin South Africa that I got over thisshyness, though I never completelyovercame it. It was impossible forme to speak without preparation. Ihesitated whenever I had to facestrange audiences and avoidedmaking a speech whenever I could.

I must say that, beyond occa-sionally exposing me to laughter,my shyness has been no disadvan-

tage whatever. In fact I can seethat, on the contrary, it has been allto my advantage. My hesitancy inspeech, which was once an annoy-ance, is now a pleasure. Its great-est benefit has been that it hasformed the habit of restraining mythoughts. A man of few words willrarely be thoughtless in his speech;he will measure every word. Myshyness has been in reality myshield. It has allowed me to grow.It has helped me in my discoveryof truth.

14. ACQUAINTANCE WITH RELIGIONS

Towards the end of my secondyear in England I came across twoTheosophists, brothers, and bothunmarried. They talked to meabout the Gita. They were readingSir Edwin Arnold’s translation –The Song Celestial and they in-vited me to read the original withthem. I felt ashamed, as I had readthe divine poem neither in Sanskritnor in Gujarati. I had to tell themthat I had not read the Gita, butthat I would gladly read it withthem, and that though my knowl-edge of Sanskrit was meagre, still Ihoped to be able to understand theoriginal to the extent of telling

where the translation failed tobring out the meaning. I beganreading the Gita with them. Theverses in the second chapter

If one,

Ponders on subjects of the sense, there

springs

Attraction; from attraction grows de-

sire,

Desire flames to fierce passion, passion

breeds

Recklessness; then the memory – all

betrayed–

Lets noble purpose go, and saps the

mind,

Till purpose, mind, and man are all

undone.

29

made a deep impression on mymind, and they still ring in myears. The book struck me as one ofpriceless worth. The impressionhas ever since been growing on mewith the result that I regard it to-day as the best book for theknowledge of Truth. It has af-forded me invaluable help in mymoments of gloom.

The brothers also recommendedThe Light of Asia* by Sir AdvinArnold, whom I knew till then asthe author only of The Song Celes-tial, and I read it with even greaterinterest than I did theBhagavadgita. Once I had begun itI could not leave off. I recall hav-ing read, at the brothers' instance,Madame Blavatsky's Key to The-osophy. This book stimulated inme the desire to read books onHinduism, and made me give upthe idea taught by missionaries thatHinduism was full of superstition.

About the same time I met agood Christian from Manchester ina vegetarian boarding house. Hetalked to me about Christianity. I

narrated to him my Rajkot recol-lections. He was pained to hearthem. He said, “I am a vegetarian.I do not drink. Many Christians aremeat-eaters and drink, no doubt;but neither meat-eating nor drink-ing is enjoined by Scripture. Doplease read The Bible.”+ I acceptedhis advice, and he got me a copy. Ibegan reading it, but I could notpossibly read through the Old Tes-tament.

But the New Testament pro-duced a different impression, espe-cially the Sermon on the Mount*which went straight to my heart. Icompared it with the Gita. Theverses, “But I say unto you, that yeresist not evil; but whosoever shallsmite thee on thy right cheek, turnto him the other also. And if anyman take away thy coat let himhave thy cloak too.” delighted mebeyond measure and put me inmind of Shamal Bhatt’s “For abowl of water, give a goodly meal”etc. My young mind tried to unifythe teaching of the Gita, the Lightof Asia and the Sermon on the

*Given in the form of a poem the message of Lord Buddha. – Ed.+ The Scripture of the Christians. It is in two parts – firstly, the Old Testament,

containing several books relating to the period prior to Jesus Christ and secondly, theNew Testament, containing books after the time of Jesus Christ. The first four books ofthe New Testament are called the Gospels and contain the story and teachings ofJesus. –Ed.

*Jesus’s teachings delivered on a mountain side. See Matthew, Chapters V toVII. – Ed.

30

Mount. That renunciation was thehighest form of religion appealedto me greatly.

Beyond this acquaintance withreligion I could not go at the mo-ment, as reading for the examina-

tion left me scarcely any time foroutside subjects. But I thought thatI should read more religious booksand acquaint myself with all theprincipal religions.

PART III : IN INDIA AS BARRISTER

15. BACK IN INDIA

I passed my examinations, wascalled to the Bar on the 10th ofJune 1891, and enrolled in theHigh Court on the 11th. On the12th I sailed for home.

But notwithstanding my studythere was no end to my helpless-ness and fear. I did not feel myselfqualified to practise law. I had readthe laws, but not learnt how topractise law. Besides, I had learntnothing at all of Indian law. I hadnot the slightest idea of Hindu andMahomedan Law. I had not evenlearnt how to draft a plaint, andfelt completely helpless. I had seri-ous misgivings as to whether Ishould be able even to earn a liv-ing by the profession.

My elder brother had come tomeet me at the dock in Bombay. Iwas pining to see my mother. Mybrother had kept me ignorant ofher death, which took place whilstI was still in England. He did notwant to give me the bad news in a

foreign land. The news, however,was none the less a severe shockto me. My grief was even greaterthan over my father’s death. Mostof my cherished hopes were shat-tered. But I remember that I didnot give myself up to any wild ex-pression of grief. I could evencheck the tears, and took to lifejust as though nothing had hap-pened.

The storm in my caste over myforeign voyage was still there. Ithad divided the caste into twocamps, one of which immediatelyre-admitted me, while the otherwas bent on keeping me out. Inever tried to seek admission tothe section that had refused it. Nordid I feel even mental resentmentagainst any of the headmen of thatsection. Some of these regardedme with dislike, but I scrupulouslyavoided hurting their feelings. Ifully respected their regulations.According to these, none of my re-

31

lations, including my father-in-lawand mother-in-law, and even mysister and brother-in-law, could en-tertain me; and I would not somuch as drink water at theirhouses. They were prepared se-cretly to lay aside the prohibition,but I did not like to do a thing insecret that I would not do in pub-lic.

The result of my scrupulousconduct was that I never had occa-sion to be troubled by the caste;nay, I have experienced nothingbut affection and generosity fromthe general body of the section thatstill regards me as outside thecaste. They have even helped mein my work, without ever expect-ing me to do anything for thecaste. It is my conviction that allthese good things are due to mynon-resistance. Had I agitated forbeing admitted to the caste, had Iattempted to divide it into morecamps, had I provoked thecastemen, they would surely haveretaliated and I would have foundmyself in a whirlpool of agitation.

To start practice in Rajkotwould have meant sure ridicule. Ihad hardly the knowledge of aqualified vakil and yet I expectedto be paid ten times his fee! Noclient would be fool enough to en-

gage me. Friends advised me to go to

Bombay for some time in order togain experience of the High Court,to study Indian law and to try andget what cases I could. I took upthe suggestion and went. But itwas impossible for me to get alongin Bombay for more than four orfive months, there being no in-come to square with the ever-in-creasing expenditure. About thistime, I took up the case of oneMamibai. It was a ‘small cause’.“You will have to pay some com-mission to the tout,”* I was told. Iemphatically declined. I gave nocommission but got Mamibai'scase all the same. It was an easycase. I charged Rs. 30 for my fees.The case was not likely to lastlonger than a day.

This was my first appearance inthe Small Cause Court. I had tocross-examine the plaintiff's wit-ness. I stood up, but my couragefailed. My head was reeling and Ifelt as though the whole Court wasdoing likewise. I could think of noquestion to ask. The judge musthave laughed, and the vakils nodoubt enjoyed the sight. But Icould not see anything. I sat downand told the agent that I could notconduct the case, that he had better

*A man who obtains cases for lawyers. – Ed.

32

engage Shri Patel and have the feeback from me. Shri Patel was dulyengaged for Rs. 51. To him, ofcourse, the case was child’s play.

I hastened from the Court, notknowing whether my client won orlost her case, but I was ashamed ofmyself, and decided not to take upany more cases untill I had cour-age enough to conduct them. So Ithought I might take up a teacher'sjob. My knowledge of English wasgood enough and I should haveloved to teach English to Matricu-lation boys in some school. In thisway I could have met part at leastof the expenses. I came across anadvertisement in the papers :‘Wanted an English teacher toteach one hour daily. Salary Rs.75.’ The advertisement was from afamous high school. I applied forthe post and was called for an in-terview. I went there in high hopes,but when the principal found that Iwas not a graduate, he regretfullyrefused me.

“But I have passed the LondonMatriculation with Latin as mysecond language.”

“True, but we want a graduate.”There was no help for it. I was

very disappointed. My brother alsofelt much worried. We both cameto the conclusion that it was nouse spending more time inBombay.

So I left Bombay and went toRajkot, where I set up my own of-fice. Here I got along moderatelywell. Drafting applications and me-morials brought me, on an average,Rs. 300 a month. For this work Ihad to thank influence rather thanmy own ability, for my brother’spartner had a settled practice. Allapplications etc. which were, reallyor to his mind, of an importantcharacter, he sent to big barristers.To my lot fell the applications tobe drafted on behalf of his poorclients.

16. THE FIRST SHOCK

My brother had been secretaryand adviser to the late Ranasahebof Porbandar before he was in-stalled on his gadi, and my brotherat this time suffered under thecharge of having given wrong ad-vice when in that office. The mat-

ter had gone to the Political Agentwho was prejudiced against mybrother. Now I had known this of-ficer when in England, and he maybe said to have been fairly friendlyto me. My brother thought that Ishould avail myself of the friend-

33

ship and putting in a good word onhis behalf, try to remove the preju-dice of the Political Agent. I didnot at all like this idea. I shouldnot, I thought, try to take advan-tage of a trifling acquaintance inEngland. If my brother was reallyat fault, what use was my recom-mendation? If he was innocent, heshould submit a petition in theproper course and, confident of hisinnocence, face the result. Mybrother did not like this advice.“You do not know Kathiawad,” hesaid, “and you have yet to knowthe world. Only influence countshere. It is not proper for you, abrother, to shirk your duty, whenyou can clearly put in a good wordabout me to an officer you know.”

I could not refuse him, so I wentto the officer much against mywill. I knew I had no right to ap-proach him and was fully con-scious that I was compromisingmy self-respect. But I sought anappointment and got it. I remindedhim of the old acquaintance, but Iimmediately saw that Kathiawadwas different from England; thatan officer on leave was not thesame as an officer on duty. ThePolitical Agent owned the acquain-tance, but the reminder seemed tostiffen him. “Surely you have notcome here to abuse that acquain-tance, have you ?” appeared to be

the meaning of that stiffness, andseemed to be written on his brow.Nevertheless I opened my case.The sahib was impatient. “Yourbrother is an intriguer. I want tohear nothing more from you. Ihave no time. If your brother hasanything to say, let him applythrough the proper channel.” Theanswer was enough, was perhapsdeserved. But selfishness is blind. Iwent on with my story. The sahibgot up and said : “You must gonow.”

“But please hear me out,” saidI. That made him more angry. Hecalled his peon and ordered him toshow me the door. I was still hesi-tating when the peon came in,placed his hands on my shouldersand put me out of the room.

The sahib went away as alsothe peon, and I departed frettingand fuming. I at once wrote outand sent over a note to this effect :“You have insulted me. You haveassaulted me through your peon. Ifyou make no amends, I shall haveto proceed against you.”

Quick came the answer throughhis sowar :

“You were rude to me. I askedyou to go and you would not. Ihad no option but to order mypeon to show you the door. Evenafter he asked you to leave the of-fice, you did not do so. He there-

34

fore had to use just enough forceto send you out. You are at libertyto proceed as you wish.”

With this answer in my pocket,I came home feeling ashamed, andtold my brother all that had hap-pened. He was grieved, but did notknow how to console me. Hespoke to his vakil friends to findout how to proceed against thesahib. Sir Pherozeshah Mehta hap-pened to be in Rajkot at this time,having come down from Bombayfor some case. But how could ajunior barrister like me dare to seehim? So I sent him the papers ofmy case, through the vakil whohad engaged him and begged forhis advice. “Tell Gandhi,” he said,“such things are the common expe-rience of many vakils and barris-ters. He is still fresh from England,and hot-blooded. He does notknow British officers. If he wouldearn something and have an easytime here, let him tear up the noteand pocket the insult. He will gainnothing by proceeding against thesahib, and on the contrary willvery likely ruin himself. Tell himhe has yet to know life.”

The advice was as bitter as poi-son to me, but I had to swallow it.I pocketed the insult, but also prof-ited by it. “Never again shall Iplace myself in such a false posi-tion, never again shall I try to ex-

ploit friendship in this way,” said Ito myself, and since then I havenever been guilty of a breach ofthat determination. This shockchanged the course of my life.

I was no doubt at fault in hav-ing gone to that officer. But hisimpatience and overbearing angerwere out of all proportion to mymistake. It did not justify expul-sion. Now most of my work wouldnaturally be in his court. I had nodesire to seek his favour. Indeed,having once threatened to proceedagainst him, I did not like to re-main silent.

Meanwhile I began to learnsomething of the petty politics ofthe country. Kathiawad, beinggroup of small states, naturally hadits rich crop of petty intrigues.Princes were always at the mercyof others and ready to lend theirears to flatterers. Even the sahib’speon had to be coaxed, and thesahib's shirastedar was more thanhis master, as he was his eyes, hisears and his interpreter. Theshirastedar's will was law, and hisincome was always reputed to bemore than the sahib's. This mayhave been an exaggeration, but hecertainly lived beyond his salary.

This atmosphere appeared tome to be poisonous, and how toremain in it was a problem for me.

I was thoroughly depressed and

35

my brother clearly saw it. We bothfelt that, if I could secure somejob, I should be free from this at-mosphere of intrigue. But withoutintrigue a ministership or judge-ship was out of the question. Andthe quarrel with the sahib stood inthe way of my practice. I did notknow what to do.

In the meantime a Meman firmfrom Porbandar wrote to mybrother making the following of-fer : “We have business in SouthAfrica. Ours is a big firm, and wehave a big case there in the Court,our claim being £ 40,000. It hasbeen going on for a long time. Wehave engaged the services of thebest vakils and barristers. If yousent your brother there, he wouldbe useful to us and also to himself.He would be able to instruct our

lawyer better than ourselves. Andhe would have the advantage ofseeing a new part of the world andof making new acquaintances.”

“How long do you require myservices ?” I asked. “And what willbe the payment ?”

“Not more than a year. We willpay you a first class return fareand a sum of £ 105, all found.”

This was hardly going there asa barrister. It was going as a ser-vant of the firm. But I wantedsomehow to leave India. There wasalso the tempting opportunity ofseeing a new country, and of hav-ing new experience. Also I couldsend £ 105 to my brother and helpin the expenses of the household. Iclosed with the offer without anybargaining, and got ready to go toSouth Africa.

PART IV : IN SOUTH AFRICA

17. ARRIVAL IN SOUTH AFRICA

The port of Natal is Durban alsoknown as Port Natal. AbdullaSheth was there to receive me. Asthe ship arrived at the quay and Iwatched the people coming onboard to meet their friends, I ob-served that Indians were not heldin much respect. I could not fail tonotice a sort of snobbishness aboutthe manner in which those who

knew Abdulla Sheth behaved to-wards him, and it stung me.Abdulla Sheth had got used to it.Those who looked at me did sowith a certain amount of curiosity.My dress marked me out fromother Indians. I had a frock-coatand a turban, in imitation of theBengal pugree.

On the second or third day of

36

me to several people and seatedme next to his attorney. The Ma-gistrate kept staring at me and fi-nally asked me to take off my tur-ban. This I refused to do and leftthe court.

So here too there was fightingin store for me.

I wrote to the press about theincident and defended the wearingof my turban in the court. Thequestion was very much discussedin the papers, which described meas an “unwelcome visitor”. Thusthe incident gave me an unex-pected advertisement in South Af-rica within a few days of my ar-rival there. My turban stayed withme practically until the end of mystay in South Africa.

my arrival he took me to see theDurban court. There he introduced

Barrister Gandhi

18. TO PRETORIA

The firm received a letter fromtheir lawyers saying preparationsshould be made for the case, andthat Abdulla Sheth should go toPretoria himself or send a repre-sentative. Abdulla Sheth gave methis letter to read, and asked me ifI would go to Pretoria. “I can onlysay after I have understood thecase from you,” said I. “At presentI do not know what I have to dothere.” He thereupon asked hisclerks to explain the case to me.

On the seventh or eighth day af-

ter my arrival, I left Durban. Afirst class seat was booked for me.It was usual there to pay five shil-lings extra, if one needed a bed-ding. Abdulla Sheth insisted that Ishould book a bedding, but out ofobstinacy and pride and with aview to saving five shillings, I de-clined. Abdulla Sheth warned me.“Look, now,” said he, “this is adifferent country from India. ThankGod, we have enough and to spare.Please do not stint yourself in any-thing that you may need.”

37

I thanked him and asked himnot to be anxious.

The train reached Maritzburg,the capital of Natal, at about 9p.m. Beddings used to be providedat this station. A railway servantcame and asked me if I wantedone. “No,” said I, “I have one withme.” He went away. But a passen-ger came next, and looked me upand down. He saw that I was a‘coloured’ man. This disturbedhim. Out he went and came inagain with one or two officials.They all kept quiet, when anotherofficial came to me and said,“Come along, you must go to thevan compartment.”

“But I have a first class ticket,”said I.

“That doesn’t matter,” rejoinedthe other. “I tell you, you must goto the van compartment.”

“I tell you, I was permitted totravel in this compartment atDurban, and I insist on going on init.”

“No, you won’t,” said the offi-cial. “You must leave this compart-ment, or else I shall have to call apolice constable to push you out.”

“Yes, you may. I refuse to getout voluntarily.”

The constable came. He took meby the hand and pushed me out.My luggage was also taken out. Irefused to go to the other compart-

ment and the train steamed away. Iwent and sat in the waiting room,keeping my handbag with me, andleaving the other luggage where itwas. The railway authorities hadtaken charge of it.

It was winter, and winter in thehigher regions of South Africa isseverely cold. Maritzburg being ata high altitude, the cold was ex-tremely bitter. My overcoat was inmy luggage, but I did not dare toask for it lest I should be insultedagain, so I sat and shivered. Therewas no light in the room. A pas-senger came in at about midnightand possibly wanted to talk to me.But I was in no mood to talk.

I began to think of my duty.Should I fight for my rights or goback to India, or should I go on toPretoria without minding the in-sults, and return to India after fin-ishing the case? It would be cow-ardice to run back to India withoutfulfilling my obligation. The hard-ship to which I was subjected wassuperficial – only a symptom ofthe deep disease of colour preju-dice. I should try, if possible, toroot out the disease and sufferhardships in the process. Redressfor wrongs I should seek only tothe extent that would be necessaryfor the removal of the colourprejudice.

So, I decided to take the next

38

available train to Pretoria.The following morning I sent a

long telegram to the General Man-ager of the Railway and also in-formed Abdulla Sheth, who imme-diately met the General Manager.The Manager justified the conductof the railway authorities, but in-formed him that he had already in-structed the Station Master to seethat I reached my destination.Abdulla Sheth wired to the Indianmerchants in Maritzburg and tofriends in other places to meet meand look after me. The merchantscame to see me at the station andtried to comfort me by narratingtheir own hardships and explainingthat what had happened to me wasnothing unusual. They also saidthat Indians travelling first or sec-ond class had to expect troublefrom railway officials and whitepassengers. The day was thus spentin listening to these tales of woe.The evening train arrived. Therewas a reserved berth for me. I nowpurchased at Maritzburg the bed-ding ticket I had refused to book atDurban.

The train reached Charlestownin the morning. There was no rail-way, in those days, betweenCharlestown and Johannesburg, butonly a stage-coach, which halted atStanderton for the night en route. Ipossessed a ticket for the coach,

which was not cancelled by thebreak of the journey at Maritzburgfor a day; besides, Abdulla Shethhad sent a wire to the coach agentat Charlestown.

But the agent only needed a pre-text for putting me off, and so,when he discovered me to be astranger, he said, “Your ticket iscancelled.” I gave him the properreply. The reason at the back of hismind was not want of accommoda-tion, but quite another. Passengershad to be accommodated inside thecoach, but as I was regarded as a‘coolie’ and looked a stranger, itwould be proper, thought the‘leader’, as the white man incharge of the coach was called, notto seat me with the white passen-gers. There were seats on eitherside of the coachbox. The leadersat on one of these as a rule. To-day he sat inside and gave me hisseat. I knew it was sheer injusticeand an insult, but I thought it bet-ter to pocket it. I could not haveforced myself inside, and if I hadraised a protest, the coach wouldhave gone off without me. Thiswould have meant the loss of an-other day, and Heaven only knowswhat would have happened thenext day. So, much as I frettedwithin myself, I prudently sat nextthe coachman.

At about three o'clock the coach

39

reached Pardekoph. Now theleader desired to sit where I wasseated, as he wanted to smoke andpossibly to have some fresh air. Sohe took a piece of dirty sack-clothfrom the driver, spread it on thefootboard and, addressing me said,“Sami, you sit on this, I want to sitnear the driver.” The insult wasmore than I could bear. In fear andtrembling I said to him, “It wasyou who seated me here, though Ishould have been accommodatedinside. I put up with the insult.Now that you want to sit outsideand smoke, you would have me sitat your feet. I will not do so, but Iam prepared to sit inside.”

As I was struggling throughthese sentences, the man camedown upon me and began heavilyto box my ears. He seized me bythe arm and tried to drag medown. I clung to the brass rails ofthe coachbox and was determinedto keep my hold even at the risk ofbreaking my wristbones. The pas-sengers were witnessing the scene– the man swearing at me, drag-ging and beating me, and I remain-ing still. He was strong, and I wasweak. Some of the passengerswere moved to pity and exclaimed:“Man, let him alone. Don’t beathim. He is not to blame. He isright. If he can’t stay there, let himcome and sit with us.” “No fear,”

cried the man, but he seemedsomewhat ashamed and stoppedbeating me. He let go my arm,swore at me a little more, and ask-ing the Hottentot servant who wassitting on the other side of thecoachbox to sit on the footboard,took the seat so vacated.

The passengers took their seatsand, the whistle given, the coachrattled away. My heart was beatingfast within my breast, and I waswondering whether I should everreach my destination alive. Theman cast an angry look at me nowand then and, pointing his finger atme, growled : “Take care, let meonce get to Standerton and I shallshow you what I do.” I sat speech-less and prayed to God to help me.

After dark we reachedStanderton and I heaved a sigh ofrelief on seeing some Indian faces.As soon as I got down, thesefriends said : “We are here to re-ceive you and take you to IsaSheth’s shop. We have had a tele-gram from Dada Abdulla.” I wasvery glad, and we went to ShethIsa Haji Summar's shop.

I wanted to inform the agent ofthe Coach Company of the wholeaffair. So I wrote him a letter, nar-rating everything that had hap-pened, and drawing his attention tothe threat this man had held out. Ialso asked for an assurance that he

40

would accommodate me with theother passengers inside the coachwhen we started the next morning.To which the agent replied to thiseffect : “From Standerton we havea bigger coach with different menin charge. The man complained ofwill not be there tomorrow, andyou will have a seat with the otherpassengers.” This somewhat re-lieved me. I had, of course, no in-tention of proceeding against theman who had assaulted me, and sothe chapter of the assault closedthere.

In the morning Isa Sheth’s mantook me to the coach. I got a goodseat and reached Johannesburgquite safely that night.

Standerton is a small village andJohannesburg a big city. AbdullaSheth had wired to Johannesburgalso and given me the name andaddress of Muhammad KasamKamruddin’s firm there. Their manhad come to receive me at thestage, but neither did I see him nordid he recognize me. So I decidedto go to a hotel. I knew the namesof several. Taking a cab I asked tobe driven to the Grand NationalHotel. I saw the Manager andasked for a room. He looked at mefor a moment, and politely saying,“I am very sorry, we are full up,”bade me good-bye. So I asked thecabman to drive to Muhammad

Kasam Kamruddin's shop. Here Ifound Abdul Gani Sheth expectingme, and he gave me a cordialgreeting. He had a hearty laughover the story of my experience atthe hotel. “How ever did you ex-pect to be admitted to a hotel?” hesaid.

“Why not ?” I asked.“You will come to know after

you have stayed here a few days,”said he.

“Look now, you have to go toPretoria tomorrow. You will haveto travel third class. Conditions inthe Transvaal are worse than inNatal. First and second class tick-ets are never issued to Indians.”

I sent for the railway regulationsand read them. There was a loop-hole. The language of the oldTransvaal enactments was not veryexact or precise; that of the rail-way regulations was even less so.

I said to the Sheth : “I wish togo first class, and if I cannot, Ishall prefer to take a cab toPretoria, a matter of only thirty-seven miles.”

Sheth Abdul Gani drew my at-tention to the extra time andmoney this would mean, butagreed to my proposal to travelfirst, and accordingly we sent anote to the station master. I men-tioned in my note that I was a bar-rister and that I always travelled

41

first. I also stated in the letter thatI needed to reach Pretoria as earlyas possible, that as there was notime to await his reply I would re-ceive it in person at the station,and that I should expect to get afirst class ticket. There was ofcourse a purpose behind asking forthe reply in person. I thought that,if the station master gave a writtenreply, he would certainly say “no”,especially because he would havehis own notion of a “coolie” bar-rister. I would therefore appear be-fore him in faultless English dress,talk to him and possibly persuadehim to issue a first class ticket. So Iwent to the station master in a frock-coat and necktie, placed a sovereignfor my fare on the counter and askedfor a first class ticket.

“You sent me that note ?” heasked.

“That is so. I shall be muchobliged if you will give me aticket. I must reach Pretoria today.”

He smiled and, moved to pity,said: “I am not a Transvaaler. I ama Hollander. I appreciate your feel-ings, and you have my sympathy. Ido want to give you a ticket – onone condition, however, that, if theguard should ask you to shift tothe third class, you will not in-volve me in the affair, by which Imean that you should not proceedagainst the railway company. Iwish you a safe journey. I can see

you are a gentleman.”With these words he booked the

ticket. I thanked him and gave himthe necessary assurance.

Sheth Abdul Gani had come tosee me off at the station. The inci-dent gave him an agreeable sur-prise, but he warned me saying : “Ishall be thankful if you reachPretoria all right. I am afraid theguard will not leave you in peacein the first class and even if hedoes, the passengers will not.”

I took my seat in a first classcompartment and the train started.At Germiston the guard came toexamine the tickets. He was angryto find me there, and signalled tome with his finger to go to thethird class. I showed him my firstclass ticket. “That does not mat-ter,” said he, “remove to the thirdclass.”

There was only one English pas-senger in the compartment. Hetook the guard to task. “What doyou mean by troubling the gentle-man ?” he said. “Don’t you see hehas a first class ticket? I do notmind in the least his travellingwith me.” Addressing me, he said,“You should make yourself com-fortable where you are.”

The guard muttered : “If youwant to travel with a coolie, whatdo I care?” and went away.

At about eight o'clock in theevening the train reached Pretoria.

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19. FIRST DAY IN PRETORIA

Pretoria station in 1893 wasquite different from what it was in1914. The lights were burningdimly. The travellers were few. Ilet all the other passengers go andthought that, as soon as the ticketcollector was fairly free, I wouldhand him my ticket and ask him ifhe could direct me to some smallhotel or any other such placewhere I might go; otherwise Iwould spend the night at the sta-tion. I must confess I shrank fromasking him even this, for I wasafraid of being insulted.

The station became clear of allpassengers. I gave my ticket to theticket collector and began my in-quiries. He replied to me courte-ously, but I saw that he could notbe of any considerable help. Butan American Negro who wasstanding near by broke into theconversation.

“I see,” said he, “that you are anutter stranger here, without anyfriends. If you will come with me Iwill take you to a small hotel, ofwhich the proprietor is an Ameri-can who is very well known to me.I think he will accept you.”

I had my own doubts about theoffer, but I thanked him and ac-cepted his suggestion. He took meto Johnston’s Family Hotel. He

drew Mr. Johnston aside to speakto him, and the latter agreed to ac-commodate me for the night, oncondition that I should have mydinner served in my room.

“I assure you,” said he, “that Ihave no colour prejudice. But Ihave only European custom, and ifI allowed you to eat in the diningroom, my guests might be of-fended and even go away.”

“Thank you,” said I, “even foraccommodating me for the night. Iam now more or less acquaintedwith the conditions here, and I un-derstand your difficulty. I do notmind your serving the dinner inmy room. I hope to be able tomake some other arrangement to-morrow.”

I was shown into a room whereI now sat waiting for the dinnerand thinking, as I was quite alone.There were not many guests in thehotel, and I had expected thewaiter to come very shortly withthe dinner. Instead Mr. Johnstonappeared. He said : “I wasashamed of having asked you tohave your dinner here. So I spoketo the other guests about you, andasked them if they would mindyour having your dinner in the din-ing room. They said they had noobjection, and that they did not

43

mind your staying here as long asyou liked. Please, therefore, cometo the dining room, if you will,and stay here as long as youwish.” I thanked him again, wentto the dining room and had ahearty dinner.

Next morning I called on the at-torney, Mr. A. W. Baker. AbdullaSheth had given me some descrip-tion of him, so his cordial recep-tion did not surprise me. He re-ceived me very warmly and madekind inquiries. I explained allabout myself. Thereupon he said:“We have no work for you here asbarrister, for we have engaged thebest lawyer. The case is a pro-longed and complicated one, so Ishall take your assistance only tothe extent of getting necessary in-

formation. And of course, you willmake communication with my cli-ent easy for me, as I shall now askfor all the information I want fromhim through you. That is certainlyan advantage. I have not yet foundrooms for you. I thought I had bet-ter do so after having seen you.There is a fearful amount of colourprejudice here, and therefore it isnot easy to find lodging for suchas you. But I know a poor woman.She is the wife of a baker. I thinkshe will take you and thus add toher income at the same time.Come, let us go to her place.”

So he took me to her house. Hespoke with her privately about me,and she agreed to accept me as aboarder at 35 shillings a week.

20. GETTING ACQUAINTED WITH THE INDIAN PROBLEM

My stay in Pretoria enabled meto make a deep study of the social,economic and political conditionof the Indians in the Transvaal andthe Orange Free State. I had noidea that this study was to be ofinvaluable service to me in the fu-ture.

It was provided under theamended law that all Indiansshould pay a poll tax of £ 3 as feefor entry into the Transvaal. Theymight not own land except in

places set apart for them, and inpractice even that was not to beownership. They had no vote. Allthis was under the special law forAsiatics, to whom the laws for thecoloured people were also applied.

Under these latter, Indians mightnot walk on public footpaths, andmight not move out of doors after9 p.m. without a permit. I oftenwent out at night for a walk with afriend, Mr. Coates, and we rarelygot back home much before ten

44

o'clock. What if the police arrestedme? Mr. Coates was more con-cerned about this than I. He had toissue passes to his Negro servants.But how could he give one to me?Only a master might issue a permitto a servant. If I had wanted one,and even if Mr. Coates had beenready to give it, he could not havedone so, for it would have beenfraud.

So Mr. Coates or some friend ofhis took me to the State Attorney,Dr. Krause. We turned out to bebarristers of the same Inn. The factthat I needed a pass to enable meto be out of doors after 9 p.m. wastoo much for him. He expressedsympathy for me. Instead of order-ing for me a pass, he gave me aletter authorizing me to be out ofdoors at all hours without policeinterference. I always kept this let-ter on me whenever I went out.The fact that I never had to makeuse of it was a mere accident.

The consequences of the regula-tion regarding the use of footpathswere rather serious for me. I al-ways went out for a walk throughPresident Street to an open plain.President Kruger’s house was inthis street – a very modest buildingwithout a garden and, not distin-guishable from other houses in itsneighbourhood.

Only the presence of a police-

man before the house indicatedthat it belonged to some official. Inearly always went along the foot-path past this patrol without theslightest hitch or hindrance.

Now the man on duty used to bechanged from time to time. Onceone of these men, without givingme the slightest warning, withouteven asking me to leave the foot-path, pushed and kicked me intothe street. I was dismayed. BeforeI could question him as to hisbehaviour, Mr. Coates, who hap-pened to be passing the spot onhorseback, hailed me and said :

“Gandhi, I have seen everything.I shall gladly be your witness incourt if you proceed against theman. I am very sorry you havebeen so rudely assaulted.”

“You need not be sorry,” I said.“What does the poor man know?All coloured people are the sameto him. He no doubt treats Negroesjust as he has treated me. I havemade it a rule not to go to court inrespect of any personal grievance.So I do not intend to proceedagainst him.”

“That is just like you,” said Mr.Coates, “but do think it over again.We must teach such men a les-son.” He then spoke to the police-man and scolded him. I could notfollow their talk as it was inDutch, the policeman being a Boer.

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But he apologized to me, forwhich there was no need. I hadalready forgiven him.

But I never again went throughthis street. There would be othermen coming in this man's placeand ignorant of the incident, theywould behave likewise. Whyshould I unnecessarily court an-other kick ? I therefore selected a

different walk.I saw that South Africa was no

country for a self-respecting In-dian, and my mind became moreand more occupied with the ques-tion as to how this state of thingsmight be improved. But my princi-pal duty for the moment was toattend to the case of DadaAbdulla.

21. THE CASE

I saw that the facts of DadaAbdulla's case made it very strongindeed, and that the law wasbound to be on his side. But I alsosaw that the case, if it were per-sisted in, would ruin both him andhis opponent, who were relativesand both belonged to the samecity. No one knew how long thecase might go on. I felt that myduty was to befriend both partiesand bring them together. I strainedevery nerve to bring about a com-promise and succeeded.

Both were happy over the result,and both rose in the public estima-

tion. My joy was boundless. I hadlearnt the true practice of law. Ihad learnt to find out the betterside of human nature and to entermen’s hearts. I realized that thetrue function of a lawyer was tounite parties driven apart by aquarrel. The lesson was so burntinto me that a large part of mytime during the twenty years of mypractice as a lawyer was occupiedin bringing about private compro-mises of hundreds of cases. I lostnothing thereby – not even money,certainly not my soul.

22. MAN PROPOSES, GOD DISPOSES

The case having been con-cluded, I had no reason for stayingin Pretoria. So I went back toDurban and began to make prepa-rations for my return home. But

Abdulla Sheth was not the man tolet me sail without a send-off. Hegave a farewell party in my honourat Sydenham.

It was proposed to spend the

46

whole day there. Whilst I wasturning over the sheets of some ofthe newspapers I found there, Ichanced to see a paragraph in acorner of one of them under thetitle ‘Indian Franchise’. It was withreference to the Bill then beforethe House of Legislature, whichsought to deprive the Indians oftheir right to elect members of theNatal Legislative Assembly. I wasignorant of the Bill and so werethe rest of the guests who hadgathered there.

I inquired of Abdulla Shethabout it. He said : “What can weunderstand in these matters? Wecan only understand things that af-fect our trade.” But I was on thepoint of returning home and hesi-tated to express what was passingthrough my mind in this matter. Isimply said to Abdulla Sheth :“This Bill, if it passes into law,will make our lot extremely diffi-cult. It strikes at the root of our

self-respect.”The other guests were listening

to this conversation with attention.One of them said: “Shall I tell youwhat should be done? You cancelyour passage by this boat, stayhere a month longer, and we willfight as you direct us.” All the oth-ers supported him.

It was now impossible for me toleave Natal. The Indian friendssurrounded me on all sides andbegged me to remain there perma-nently. Thus I settled in Natal.Continued agitation was essentialfor making an impression on theSecretary of State for the Colonies.For this purpose it was thoughtnecessary to bring into being a per-manent organization. So I con-sulted Sheth Abdulla and otherfriends, and we all decided to havea public organization of a perma-nent character, and on the 22ndMay* the Natal Indian Congresscame into being.

*of 1894

23. THE £ 3 TAX

About the year 1860 the Europe-ans in Natal, finding that there wasconsiderable scope for sugarcanecultivation, felt themselves in needof labour. Without outside labourthe cultivation of cane and the

manufacture of sugar were impos-sible, as the Natal Zulus were notsuited to this form of work. TheNatal Government therefore corres-ponded with the Indian Govern-ment, and secured their permission

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to recruit Indian labour. These re-cruits were to sign an agreement orindenture to work in Natal for fiveyears, and at the end of the termthey were to be at liberty to settlethere and to have full rights ofownership of land. Those were theinducements held out to them.

But the Indians gave more thanhad been expected of them. Theygrew large quantities of vegetables.They introduced a number of In-dian varieties and made it possibleto grow the local varieties cheaper.They also introduced the mango.Nor did their enterprise stop at ag-riculture. They entered trade. Theypurchased land for building, andmany raised themselves from thestatus of labourers to that of own-ers of land and houses. Merchantsfrom India followed them andsettled there for trade.

The white traders were alarmed.When they first welcomed the In-dian labourers, they did not knowtheir business skill. They might betolerated as independent agricultur-ists, but their competition in tradecould not be allowed.

This sowed the seed of the an-tagonism to Indians. Many otherfactors contributed to its growth.

Through legislation this antago-nism found its expression in a billto impose a tax on the indenturedIndians.

We organized a fierce campaignagainst this tax. Had the commu-nity given up the struggle, had theCongress abandoned the campaignand submitted to the tax as inevi-table, the hated tax would havecontinued to be levied from the in-dentured Indians until this day, tothe eternal shame of the Indians inSouth Africa and of the whole ofIndia.

By now I had been three yearsin South Africa. I had got to knowthe people and they had got toknow me. In 1896 I asked permis-sion to go home for six months,for I saw that I was in for a longstay there. I had established afairly good practice, and could seethat people felt the need of mypresence. So I made up my mindto go home, fetch my wife andchildren, and then return and settleout there. I also saw that, if I wenthome, I might be able to do theresome public work by educatingpublic opinion and creating moreinterest in the Indians in South Af-rica.

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PART V : VISIT TO INDIA

24. IN INDIA

I went straight to Rajkot withouthalting at Bombay and began tomake preparations for writing apamphlet on the situation in SouthAfrica. The writing and publicationof the pamphlet took about amonth. It had a green cover andcame to be known afterwards asthe Green Pamphlet. In it I drew apurposely subdued picture of thecondition of Indians in South Af-rica. Ten thousand copies wereprinted and sent to all the papersand leaders of every party in India.A summary of the article wascabled by Reuter to England, and asummary of that summary wascabled to Natal by Reuter’s Lon-don office. This cable was notlonger than three lines in print. Itwas a brief, but exaggerated, edi-tion of the picture I had drawn ofthe treatment accorded to the Indi-ans in Natal, and it was not in mywords. We shall see later on theeffect this had in Natal. In themeanwhile every paper of notecommented at length on the ques-tion.

To get these pamphlets ready forposting was no small matter. Itwould have been expensive too, ifI had employed paid help for pre-

paring wrappers etc. But I hit upona much simpler plan. I gatheredtogether all the children in my lo-cality and asked them to volunteertwo or three hours’ labour of amorning, when they had no school.This they willingly agreed to do. Ipromised to bless them, and givethem, as a reward, used postagestamps which I had collected. Theygot through the work in no time.That was my first experiment ofhaving little children as volunteers.Two of those little friends are myco-workers today.

It was my intention to educatepublic opinion in cities on thisquestion by organizing meetings,and Bombay was the first city Ichose. After Bombay and Poona Iwent to Madras, and from MadrasI proceeded to Calcutta. There Ireceived the following cable fromDurban: “Parliament opens Janu-ary. Return soon.”

So in the beginning of Decem-ber I set sail second time for SouthAfrica, now with my wife and twosons and the only son of my wid-owed sister. Another steamshipNaderi also sailed for Durban atthe same time. The agents of theCompany were Dada Abdulla and

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Co. The total number of passen-gers these boats carried must havebeen about eight hundred, half of

whom where bound for theTransvaal.

PART VI : BACK IN SOUTH AFRICA

25. STORMY ARRIVAL IN SOUTH AFRICA

The two ships cast anchor in theport of Durban on or about the18th of December. No passengersare allowed to land at any of theSouth African ports before beingsubjected to a thorough medicalexamination. If the ship has anypassenger suffering from conta-gious disease, she has to undergo aperiod of quarantine. As there hadbeen plague in Bombay when weset sail, we feared that we mighthave to go through a brief quaran-tine. The doctor came and exam-ined us. He ordered a five days'quarantine because, in his opinion,plague germs took twenty-threedays at the most to develop. Ourship was therefore ordered to beput in quarantine until the twenty-third day of our sailing fromBombay. But this quarantine orderhad more than health reasons be-hind it.

The white residents of Durbanhad been agitating for our repatria-tion, and the agitation was one ofthe reasons for the order. DadaAbdulla and Co. kept us regularly

informed about the daily happen-ings in the town. The whites wereholding monster meetings everyday. On one side there was a hand-ful of poor Indians and a few oftheir English friends, and on theother were ranged the white men,strong in arms, in numbers, in edu-cation and in wealth. They hadalso the backing of the State, forthe Natal Government openlyhelped them.

We arranged all sorts of gameson the ships for the entertainmentof the passengers. I took part inthe merriment, but my heart was inthe combat that was going on inDurban. For I was the real target.There were two charges againstme :

1. that whilst in India I had in-dulged in unmerited condemnationof the Natal whites;

2. that with a view to swampingNatal with Indians I had speciallybrought the two shiploads of pas-sengers to settle there.

But I was absolutely innocent. Ihad induced no one to go to Natal.

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I did not know the passengerswhen they embarked. And with theexception of a couple of relatives,I did not know the name and ad-dress of even one of the hundredsof passengers on board. Neitherhad I said, whilst in India, a wordabout the whites in Natal that Ihad not already said in Natal itself.And I had ample evidence in sup-port of all that I had said.

Thus the days dragged on theirweary length.

At the end of twenty-three daysthe ships were permitted to enterthe harbour, and orders permittingthe passengers to land werepassed.

So the ships were brought intothe dock and the passengers beganto go ashore. But Mr. Escombe, amember of the Cabinet, had sentword to the captain that, as thewhites were highly enraged againstme and my life was in danger, myfamily and I should be advised toland at dusk, when the Port Super-intendent, Mr. Tatum, would escortus home. The captain communi-cated the message to me, and Iagreed to act accordingly. Butscarcely half an hour after this, Mr.Laughton, a friend and advocate ofthe Indian community in Durban,came to the captain. He said : “Iwould like to take Mr. Gandhiwith me, should he have no objec-

tion. As the legal adviser of theAgent Company I tell you that youare not bound to carry out the mes-sage you have received from Mr.Escombe.” After this he came tome and said somewhat to this ef-fect : “If you are not afraid, I sug-gest that Mrs. Gandhi and the chil-dren should drive to Mr.Rustomji’s house, whilst you and Ifollow them on foot. I do not at alllike the idea of your entering thecity like a thief in the night. I donot think there is any fear of any-one hurting you. Everything isquiet now. The whites have all dis-persed. But in any case I am con-vinced that you ought not to enterthe city stealthily.” I readilyagreed. My wife and childrendrove safely to Mr. Rustomji’splace. With the captain's permis-sion I went ashore with Mr.Laughton. Mr. Rustomji’s housewas about two miles from thedock.

As soon as we landed, someyoungsters recognized me andshouted “Gandhi, Gandhi.” Abouthalf a dozen men rushed to thespot and joined in the shouting.Mr. Laughton feared that thecrowd might swell and hailed arickshaw. I had never liked theidea of being in a rickshaw. Thiswas to be my first experience. Butthe youngsters would not let me

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get into it. They frightened therickshaw boy out of his life, andhe took to his heels. As we wentahead the crowd continued toswell, until it became impossibleto proceed further. They firstcaught hold of Mr. Laughton andseparated us. Then they pelted mewith stones, brickbats and rotteneggs. Someone snatched away myturban, whilst others began to beatand kick me. I fainted and caughthold of the front railings of ahouse and stood there to get mybreath. But it was impossible.They came upon me boxing andbeating. The wife of the Police Su-perintendent, who knew me, hap-pened to be passing by. The bravelady came up, opened her umbrellathough there was no sun then, andstood between the crowd and me.This checked the fury of the mob,as it was difficult for them to de-liver blows on me without harmingMrs. Alexander.

Meanwhile an Indian youth whowitnessed the incident had run tothe police station. The Police Su-perintendent, Mr. Alexander, sent afew men to ring me round andtake me safely to my destination.They arrived in time. The policestation lay on our way. As wereached there, the Superintendentasked me to take refuge in the sta-tion, but I gratefully declined the

offer. “They are sure to quiet downwhen they realize their mistake,” Isaid. “I have trust in their sense offairness.” Escorted by the police, Iarrived without further harm at Mr.Rustomji's place. I had bruises allover, but no wounds except in oneplace. Dr. Dadibarjor, the ship'sdoctor, who was on the spot, ren-dered the best possible help.

There was quiet inside, but out-side the whites surrounded thehouse. Night was coming on, andthe yelling crowd was shouting,“We must have Gandhi.” Thequick-sighted Police Superinten-dent was already there trying tokeep the crowd under control, notby threats, but by humouring them.But he was not entirely free fromanxiety. He sent me a message tothis effect : “If you would saveyour friend's house and propertyand also your family, you shouldescape from the house in disguise,as I suggest.”

As suggested by theSperintendent, I put on an Indianconstable's uniform and wore onmy head a Madrasi scarf, wrappedround a plate to serve as a helmet.Two detectives accompanied me,one of them disguised as an Indianmerchant and with his face paintedto resemble that of an Indian. Iforget the disguise of the other. Wereached a neighbouring shop by a

52

by-lane and, making our waythrough the gunny bags piled inthe godown, escaped by the gate ofthe shop and made our waythrough the crowd to a carriagethat had been kept for me at theend of the street. In this we droveoff to the same police stationwhere Mr. Alexander had offeredme refuge a short time before, andI thanked him and the detectiveofficers.

Whilst I had been thus effectingmy escape, Mr. Alexander hadkept the crowd amused by singingthe tune :

“Hang old Gandhi !On the sour apple tree.”When he was informed of my

safe arrival at the police station, hethus broke the news to the crowd :“Well, your victim has made goodhis escape through a neighbouringshop. You had better go homenow.” Some of them were angry,others laughed, some refused tobelieve the story.

“Well then,” said the Superin-tendent, “if you do not believe me,you may appoint one or two repre-sentatives, whom I am ready totake inside the house. If they suc-ceed in finding out Gandhi, I willgladly deliver him to you. But ifthey fail, you must disperse. I amsure that you have no intention ofdestroying Mr. Rustomji's house or

of harming Mr. Gandhi's wife andchildren.”

The crowd sent their representa-tives to search the house. Theysoon returned with disappointingnews, and the crowd broke up atlast, most of them admiring theSuperintendent's tactful handling ofthe situation, and a few frettingand fuming.

The late Mr. Chamberlain, whowas then Secretary of State for theColonies, cabled asking the NatalGovernment to prosecute my as-sailants. Mr. Escombe sent for me,expressed his regret for the injuriesI had sustained, and said : “Believeme, I cannot feel happy over theleast little injury done to your per-son. You had a right to accept Mr.Laughton's advice and to face theworst, but I am sure that, if youhad considered my suggestionfavourably, these sad occurrenceswould not have happened. If youcan identify the assailants, I amprepared to arrest and prosecutethem. Mr. Chamberlain also de-sires me to do so.”

To which I gave the followingreply :

“I do not want to prosecute any-one. It is possible that I may beable to identify one or two ofthem, but what is the use of get-ting them punished? Besides, I donot hold the assailants to blame.

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They were given to understand thatI had made exaggerated and dam-aging statements in India about thewhites in Natal. If they believedthese reports, it is no wonder thatthey were enraged. The leadersand, if you will permit me to sayso, you are to blame. You couldhave guided the people properly,but you also believed Reuter andassumed that I must have indulgedin exaggeration. I do not want toprosecute anyone. I am sure that,when the truth becomes known,they will be sorry for their con-duct.”

“Would you mind giving me thisin writing ?” said Mr. Escombe.“Because I shall have to cable toMr. Chamberlain to that effect. Ido not want you to make any state-ment in haste. You may, if youlike, consult Mr. Laughton andyour other friends, before youcome to a final decision. I mayconfess, however, that, if you setaside the right of prosecuting yourassailants, you will considerablyhelp me in restoring quiet, besidesincreasing your own reputation.”

“Thank you,” said I. “I need not

consult anyone. I had made my de-cision in the matter before I cameto you. It is my conviction that Ishould not prosecute the assailants,and I am prepared this moment toreduce my decision to writing.”

With this I gave him the neces-sary statement.

On the day of landing, a repre-sentation of the Natal Advertiserhad come to interview me. He hadasked me a number of questions,and in reply I had been able torefute every one of the charges thathad been levelled against me.

This interview and my refusal toprosecute the assailants producedsuch a profound impression thatthe Europeans of Durban wereashamed of their conduct. Thepress declared me to be innocentand condemned the mob. Thus thelynching ultimately proved to be ablessing for me, that is, for thecause. It increased the prestige ofthe Indian community in South Af-rica and made my work easier. Inthree or four days I went to myhouse, and it was not long before Isettled down again.

26. SIMPLE LIFE

The washerman's bill was heavy,and as he was besides by no meansnoted for his punctuality, even two

to three dozen shirts and collarsproved insufficient for me. Collarshad to be changed daily and shirts,

54

if not daily, at least every alternateday. This meant a double expense,which appeared to me unnecessary.So I equipped myself with a wash-ing outfit to save it. I bought abook on washing, studied the artand taught it also to my wife. Thisno doubt added to my work, but itsnovelty made it a pleasure.

I shall never forget the first col-lar that I washed myself. I had usedmore starch than necessary, theiron had not been made hotenough, and for fear of burning thecollar I had not pressed it suffi-ciently. The result was that, thoughthe collar was fairly stiff, the su-perfluous starch continuallydropped off it. I went to court withthe collar on, thus inviting the ridi-cule of brother barristers, but evenin those days I could be indifferentto ridicule.

“Well,” said I, “this is my firstexperience at washing my own col-lars and hence the loose starch. Butit does not trouble me, and thenthere is the advantage of providingyou with so much fun.”

“But surely, there is no lack oflaundries here ?” asked a friend.

“The laundry bill is very heavy,”said I. “The charge for washing acollar is almost as much as itsprice, and even then there is theeternal dependence on thewasherman. I prefer by far to wash

my things myself.”In the same way, as I freed my-

self from slavery to thewasherman, I threw off dependenceon the barber. All people who go toEngland learn there at least the artof shaving, but none, to my knowl-edge, learn to cut their own hair. Ihad to learn that too. I once wentto an English hair-cutter inPretoria. He contemptuously re-fused to cut my hair. I certainly felthurt, but immediately purchased apair of clippers and cut my hairbefore the mirror. I succeeded moreor less in cutting the front hair, butI spoiled the back. The friends inthe court shook with laughter.

“What's wrong with your hair,Gandhi? Rats have been at it ?”

“No. The white barber wouldnot condescend to touch my blackhair,” said I, “so I preferred to cutit myself, no matter how badly.”

The reply did not surprise thefriends.

The barber was not at fault inhaving refused to cut my hair.There was every chance of his los-ing his customers, if he shouldserve black men. We do not allowour barbers to serve our ‘untouch-able’ brethren. I got the reward ofthis in South Africa, not once, butmany times, and the conviction thatit was the punishment for our ownsins saved me from becoming angry.

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27. A RECOLLECTION AND PENANCE

When I was practising inDurban, my office clerks oftenstayed with me, and there wereamong them Hindus and Chris-tians, or to describe them by theirprovinces, Gujaratis and Tamilians.I do not recollect having ever re-garded them as anything but mykith and kin. One of the clerks wasa Christian, born of so-called un-touchable parents.

The house was built after theWestern model and the roomsrightly had no outlets for dirty wa-ter. Each room had therefore cham-ber-pots. Rather than have thesecleaned by a servant or, a sweeper,my wife or I attended to them. Theclerks who made themselves com-pletely at home would naturallyclean their own pots, but theChristian clerk was a newcomer,and it was our duty to attend to hisbedroom. My wife managed thepots of the others, but to cleanthose used by one who had been‘untouchable’ seemed to her to bethe limit, and we fell out. Shecould not bear the pots beingcleaned by me, neither did she likedoing it herself. Even today I canrecall the picture of her scoldingme, her eyes red with anger andtears streaming down her cheeks,as she descended the staircase, pot

in hand. But I was a cruelly kindhusband. I regarded myself as herteacher, and so troubled her out ofmy blind love for her.

I was far from being satisfied byher merely carrying the pot. I wouldhave her do it cheerfully. So I said,raising my voice : “I will not standthis nonsense in my house.”

The words pierced her like anarrow.

She shouted back : “Keep yourhouse to yourself and let me go.” Iforgot myself, and the spring ofcompassion dried up in me. Icaught her by the hand, draggedthe helpless woman to the gate,which was just opposite the stair-case, and proceeded to open itwith the intention of pushing herout. The tears were running downher cheeks in torrents, and shecried : “Have you no sense ofshame ? Must you so far forgetyourself? Where am I to go? Ihave no parents or relatives thereto shelter me. Being your wife,you think I must put up with yourcuffs and kicks? For Heaven's sakebehave yourself, and shut the gate.Let us not be found making sceneslike this !”

I put on a brave face, but wasreally ashamed and shut the gate.If my wife could not leave me,

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neither could I leave her. We havehad numerous quarrels, but the endhas always been peace between us.

The wife, with her matchless pow-ers of endurance, has always beenthe victor.

28. THE BOER WAR

I must skip many other experi-ences of the period between 1897and 1899 and come straight to theBoer War.

I have minutely dealt with theinner struggle regarding this in myHistory of Satyagraha in South Af-rica, and I must not repeat the ar-gument here. I invite the curious toturn to those pages. Suffice it tosay that my loyalty to the Britishrule drove me to participation withthe British in that war. I felt that, ifI demanded rights as a British citi-zen, it was also my duty, as such,

to participate in the defence of theBritish Empire.

Our corps was 1,100 strong,with nearly 40 leaders. Duringthese days we had to march fromtwenty to twenty-five miles a day,bearing the wounded on stretchers.Amongst the wounded we had thehonour of carrying soldiers likeGeneral Woodgate. The corps wasdisbanded after six weeks' service.

Our humble work was at themoment much praised, and the In-dians' prestige was enhanced.

In the Uniform of a leader of the Indian Ambulance Corps

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29. COSTLY GIFTS

On my relief from war-duty Ifelt that my work was no longer inSouth Africa but in India. Friendsat home were also pressing me toreturn, and I felt that I should beof more service in India. So I re-quested my co-workers to relieveme. After very great difficulty myrequest was conditionally accepted,the condition being that I shouldbe ready to go back to South Af-rica if, within a year, the commu-nity should need me. Farewellmeetings were arranged at everyplace, and costly gifts were pre-sented to me. The gifts of courseincluded things in gold and silver,but there were articles of diamondas well.

The evening I was presentedwith the bulk of these things I hada sleepless night. I walked up anddown my room deeply agitated,but could find no solution. It wasdifficult for me to forgo giftsworth hundreds, it was more diffi-cult to keep them.

And even if I could keep them,what about my children? Whatabout my wife? They were beingtrained to a life of service and toan understanding that service wasits own reward.

I had no costly ornaments in thehouse. We had been fast simplify-

ing our life. How then could weafford to have gold watches? Howcould we afford to wear goldchains and diamond rings? Eventhen I was telling people to con-quer the infatuation for jewellery.What was I now to do with thejewellery that had come upon me?

I decided that I could not keepthese things. I drafted a letter, cre-ating a trust of them in favour ofthe community and appointingParsi Rustomji and others trustees.In the morning I held a consulta-tion with my wife and children andfinally got rid of the heavy burden.

I knew that I should have somedifficulty in persuading my wife,and I was sure that I should havenone so far as the children wereconcerned. So I decided to consti-tute them my pleaders.

The children readily agreed tomy proposal. ”We do not needthese costly presents, we must re-turn them to the community, andshould we ever need them, wecould easily purchase them,” theysaid.

I was delighted. “Then you willplead with mother, won't you ?” Iasked them.

“Certainly,” said they. “That isour business. She does not need towear the ornaments. She would

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want to keep them for us, and ifwe don't want them, why shouldshe not agree to part with them ?”

But it was easier said than done.“You may not need them,” said

my wife. “Your children may notneed them. Cajoled they will danceto your tune. I can understand yournot permitting me to wear them.But what about my daughters-in-law? They will be sure to needthem. And who knows what willhappen tomorrow? I would be thelast person to part with gifts solovingly given.”

And thus the torrent of argumentwent on, strengthened in the endby tears. But I was determined to

return the ornaments. I somehowsucceeded in the end in extorting aconsent from her. The gifts re-ceived in 1896 and 1901 were allreturned. A trust-deed was pre-pared, and they were depositedwith a bank, to be used for theservice of the community, accord-ing to my wishes or to those of thetrustees.

I have never since regretted thestep, and as the years have goneby, my wife has also seen its wis-dom. It has saved us from manytemptations.

I am definitely of opinion that apublic worker should accept nocostly gifts.

PART VII : BACK IN INDIA

30. MY FIRST CONGRESS

After reaching India I spentsome time in going about thecountry. It was the year 1901 whenthe Congress met at Calcutta underthe presidentship of Mr. (later Sir)Dinshaw Wacha. And I of courseattended it. It was my first experi-ence of the Congress.

I asked a volunteer where I wasto go. He took me to the RiponCollege, where a number of del-egates were being put up. The vo-lunteers were clashing against oneanother. You asked one of them to

do something. He sent you to an-other, and he in his turn to a thirdand so on; and as for the delegates,they were neither here nor there.

There was no limit to insanita-tion. Pools of water were every-where. There were only a few la-trines, and the recollection of theirstink still oppresses me. I pointedit out to the volunteers. They saidpoint blank: “That is not our work,it is the scavenger’s work.” I askedfor a broom. The man stared at mein wonder. I got one and cleaned

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the latrine. But that was for my-self. The rush was so great, andthe latrines were so few, that theyneeded frequent cleaning; but thatwas more than I could do.

There were yet two days for theCongress session to begin. I hadmade up my mind to offer my ser-vices to the Congress office in or-der to gain some experience. BabuBhupendranath Basu and Sjt.Ghosal were the secretaries. I wentto Bhupenbabu and offered my ser-vices. He looked at me, and said :“I have no work, but possiblyGhosalbabu might have somethingto give you. Please go to him.”

So I went to him. He looked atme and said with a smile: “I cangive you only clerical work. Willyou do it ?”

“Certainly,” said I. “I am here todo anything that is not beyond mycapacity.”

Shri Ghosal used to get his shirtbuttoned by his bearer. I volun-teered to do the bearer's duty, and Iloved to do it, as my regard forelders was always great. When hecame to know this, he did notmind my doing little acts of per-sonal service for him. In fact hewas delighted. The benefit I re-ceived from this service is incalcu-lable.

In a few days I came to knowthe working of the Congress. I met

most of the leaders.Sir Pherozeshah had agreed to

admit my resolution on South Af-rica, but I was wondering whowould put it before the SubjectsCommittee, and when. For therewere lengthy speeches to everyresolution all in English and everyresolution had some well-knownleader to back it. As the night wasclosing in, my heart beat fast. Ev-eryone was hurrying to go. It was11 o'clock. I had not the courage tospeak. I had already met Gokhale,who had looked at my resolution.So I drew near his chair and whis-pered to him : “Please do some-thing for me.”

“So we have done ?” said SirPherozeshah Mehta.

“No, no, there is still the resolu-tion on South Africa. Mr. Gandhihas been waiting long,” cried outGokhale.

“Have you seen the resolution ?”asked Sir Pherozeshah.

“Of course.”“Do you like it ?”“It is quite good.”“Well then, let us have it,

Gandhi.”I read it trembling.Gokhale supported it.“Unanimously passed,” cried out

everyone.“You will have five minutes to

speak to it Gandhi,” said Mr. Wacha.

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The procedure was far frompleasing to me. No one hadtroubled to understand the resolu-tion, everyone was in a hurry to goand because Gokhale had seen theresolution, it was not thought nec-essary for the rest to see it or un-derstand it !

And yet the very fact that it waspassed by the Congress wasenough to delight my heart. Theknowledge that the approval of theCongress meant that of the wholecountry was enough to delight any-one.

31. IN BOMBAY

Gokhale was very anxious that Ishould settle down in Bombay,practise at the bar and help in pub-lic work.

I prospered in my professionbetter than I had expected. MySouth African clients often en-trusted me with some work, and itwas enough to enable me to paymy way.

Just when I seemed to be set-

tling down as I had intended, I re-ceived an unexpected cable fromSouth Africa: “Chamberlain ex-pected here. Please return immedi-ately.” I remembered my promiseand cabled to say that I should beready to start the moment they sentme money. They promptly re-sponded. I gave up the chambersand started for South Africa.

PART VIII : IN SOUTH AFRICA AGAIN

32. IN SOUTH AFRICA AGAIN

I reached Durban not a day toosoon. There was work waiting forme. The date for the deputation towait on Mr. Chamberlain had beenfixed. I had to draft the memorialto be submitted to him and accom-pany the deputation.

Mr. Chamberlain, however, gavea cold shoulder to the Indian depu-tation.

“You know,” he said, “that theImperial Government has littlecontrol over self-governing Colo-nies. Your grievances seem to begenuine. I shall do what I can, butyou must try your best to placatethe Europeans, if you wish to livein their midst.”

The reply cast a chill over themembers of the deputation. I was

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my colleagues.I added : “To tell you the truth,

the work for which you had calledme is practically finished. But Ibelieve I ought not to leave theTransvaal, so far as it is possible,even if you permit me to returnhome. Instead of carrying on mywork from Natal, as before, I mustnow do so from here. I must nolonger think of returning to Indiawithin a year, but must get en-rolled in the Transvaal SupremeCourt. I have confidence enough todeal with this new department. Ifwe do not do this, the communitywill be driven out of the country.”

So I set the ball rolling, dis-cussed things with Indians inPretoria and Johannesburg, and ul-timately decided to set up office inJohannesburg.

In his office at JohannesburgSouth Africa

also disappointed. It was an eye-opener for us all, and I saw thatwe should start with our workafresh. I explained the situation to

33. STUDY OF THE GITA

I already had faith in the Gita,which had a fascination for me.Now I realized the necessity ofdiving deeper into it. I had one ortwo translations, by means ofwhich I tried to understand theoriginal Sanskrit. I decided also toget by heart one or two verses ev-ery day. For this purpose I em-ployed the time of my morning ab-lutions. The operation took methirty-five minutes, fifteen minutes

for the toothbrush and twenty forthe bath. So on the wall opposite Istuck slips of paper on which werewritten the Gita verses and referredto them now and then to help mymemory. This time was found suf-ficient for memorizing the dailyportion and recalling the verses al-ready learnt. I remember havingthus committed to memory thirteenchapters.

To me the Gita became the

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guide of conduct. It became mydictionary of daily reference.Words like aparigraha (non-pos-session) and samabhava (equabi-lity) gripped me. How to cultivateand preserve that equability wasthe question. Was I to give up all Ihad and follow Him? Straightcame the answer: I could not fol-low Him unless I gave up all Ihad. I then wrote toRavishankerbhai to allow the in-surance policy to lapse and getwhatever could be recovered, or

else to regard the premiums al-ready paid as lost, for I had be-come convinced that God, whocreated my wife and children aswell as myself, would take care ofthem. To my brother, who hadbeen as father to me, I wrote ex-plaining that I had given him allthat I had saved up to that mo-ment, but that henceforth heshould expect nothing from me,for future savings, if any, would beutilized for the benefit of the com-munity.

34. THE MAGIC SPELL OF A BOOK

Mr. Polak, a friend of mine,came to see me off to Durban, andleft with me a book to read duringthe journey, which he said I wassure to like. It was Ruskin's UntoThis Last.

The book was impossible to layaside, once I had begun it. Itgripped me. Johannesburg toDurban was a twenty-four hours'journey. The train reached there inthe evening. I could not get anysleep that night. I determined tochange my life in accordance withthe ideals of the book.

I believe that I discovered someof my deepest convictions reflectedin this great book of Ruskin, andthat is why it so captured me andmade me transform my life.

The teaching of Unto This Last Iunderstood to be :

1. That the good of the individualis contained in the good of all.

2. That a lawyer's work has thesame value as the barber's inas-much as all have the same right ofearning their livelihood from theirwork.

3. That a life of labour, i.e. the lifeof the tiller of the soil and the handi-craftsman is the life worth living.

The first of these I knew. Thesecond I had dimly realized. Thethird had never occurred to me.Unto This Last made it as clear asdaylight for me that the second andthe third were contained in the first.I arose with the dawn, ready toreduce these principles to practice.

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35. THE PHOENIX SETTLEMENT

I talked over the whole thingwith Mr. West, who was in chargeof the printing of Indian Opinion,which was a weekly paper that Iwas running, described to him theeffect Unto This Last had producedon my mind, and proposed that In-dian Opinion should be removedto a farm, on which everyoneshould labour, drawing the sameliving wage, and attending to thepress work in spare time. Mr. Westapproved of the proposal, and £3was laid down as the monthly al-

lowance per head, irrespective ofcolour or nationality.

Thus the Phoenix Settlementwas started in 1904 and there inspite of numerous odds IndianOpinion continued to be published.

I had now given up all hope ofreturning to India in the near fu-ture. I had promised my wife that Iwould return home within a year.The year was gone without anyprospect of my return, so I decidedto send for her and the children.

36. THE ZULU REBELLION

Just when I felt that I should bebreathing in peace, an unexpectedevent happened. The papersbrought the news of the outbreakof the Zulu ‘rebellion’ in Natal. Ibore no grudge against the Zulus,they had harmed no Indian. I haddoubts about the ‘rebellion’ itself.But I then believed that the BritishEmpire existed for the welfare ofthe world. Natal had a VolunteerDefence Force.

I considered myself a citizen ofNatal, being intimately connectedwith it. So I wrote to the Gover-nor, expressing my readiness, ifnecessary, to form an Indian Am-bulance Corps. He replied immedi-

ately accepting the offer.I went to Durban and appealed

for men. In order to give me astatus and to facilitate work, asalso in accordance with the exist-ing convention, the Chief MedicalOfficer appointed me to the tempo-rary rank of Sergeant Major andthree men selected by me to theranks of sergeants and one to thatof corporal. We also received ouruniforms from the Government.Our Corps was on active servicefor nearly six weeks. Our mainwork was to be the nursing of thewounded Zulus. The Medical Of-ficer in charge welcomed us. Hesaid the white people were not

64

willing nurses for the woundedZulus, that their wounds were fes-tering, and that he was at his wits'

end. He hailed our arrival as agodsend for those innocent people.

37. KASTURBA’S COURAGE

A medical friend once advised asurgical operation for my wife, towhich she agreed after some hesi-tation. She was getting very thin,and the doctor had to perform theoperation without chloroform. Itwas successful, but she had to suf-fer much pain. She, however, wentthrough it with wonderful bravery.The doctor and his wife whonursed her were all attention. Thiswas in Durban. The doctor gaveme leave to go to Johannesburg,and told me not to have any anxi-ety about the patient.

In a few days, however, I re-ceived a letter to the effect thatKasturba was worse, too weak tosit up in bed, and had once be-come unconscious. The doctorknew that he might not, withoutmy consent give her wines ormeat. So he telephoned to me atJohannesburg for permission togive her beef tea. I replied sayingthat I could not grant the permis-sion, but that, if she was in a con-dition to express her wish in thematter she might be consulted andshe was free to do as she liked.“But,” said the doctor, “I refuse to

consult the patient's wishes in thematter. You must come yourself. Ifyou do not leave me free to pre-scribe whatever diet I like, I willnot hold myself responsible foryour wife's life.”

I took the train for Durban thesame day, and met the doctor whoquietly broke this news to me : “Ihad already given Mrs. Gandhibeef tea when I telephoned toyou.”

“Now, doctor, I call this afraud,” said I.

“No question of fraud in pre-scribing medicine or diet for a pa-tient. In fact we doctors consider ita virtue to deceive patients or theirrelatives, if thereby we can saveour patients,” said the doctor withdetermination.

I was deeply pained, but keptcool. The doctor was a good manand a personal friend. He and hiswife had laid me under a debt ofgratitude, but I was not prepared toput up with his medical morals.

“Doctor, tell me what you pro-pose to do now. I would never al-low my wife to be given meat orbeef, even if the denial meant her

65

death, unless of course she desiredto take it.”

“You are welcome to your phi-losophy. I tell you that, so long asyou keep your wife under my treat-ment, I must have the option togive her anything I wish. If youdon't like this, I must regretfullyask you to remove her. I can't seeher die under my roof.”

I think one of my sons was withme. He entirely agreed with me,and said his mother should not begiven beef tea. I next spoke toKasturba herself. She was reallytoo weak to be consulted in thismatter. But I thought it my painfulduty to do so. I told her what hadpassed between the doctor and my-self. She gave a firm reply : “I willnot take beef tea. It is a rare thingin this world to be born as a hu-man being, and I would far ratherdie in your arms than pollute mybody with such abominations.”

I pleaded with her. I told herthat she was not bound to followme. I cited to her the instances ofHindu friends and acquaintanceswho had no scruples about takingmeat or wine as medicine. But shewas adamant. “No,” said she,“pray remove me at once.”

So we decided to leave the placeat once. It was drizzling and the

station was some distance. We hadto take the train from Durban forPhoenix, whence our Settlementwas reached by a road of twomiles and a half. I was undoubt-edly taking a very great risk, but Itrusted in God, and proceeded withmy task. I sent a messenger toPhoenix in advance, with a mes-sage to West to receive us at thestation with a hammock, a bottleof hot milk and one of hot water,and six men to carry Kasturba inthe hammock. I got a rickshaw toenable me to take her by the nextavailable train, put her into it inthat dangerous condition, andmarched away.

Kasturba needed no cheering up.On the contrary, she comforted me,saying : “Nothing will happen tome. Don’t worry.”

She was mere skin and bone,having had no nourishment fordays. The station platform wasvery large and as the rickshawcould not be taken inside, one hadto walk some distance before onecould reach the train. So I carriedher in my arms and put her intothe compartment. From Phoenixwe carried her in the hammock,and there she slowly picked upstrength under water-cure treat-ment.

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38. DOMESTIC SATYAGRAHA

Now it happened that Kasturba,who was well for a brief periodafter her operation, fell ill again.She had not much faith in my rem-edies, though she did not resistthem. She certainly did not ask foroutside help. So when all my rem-edies had failed, I entreated her togive up salt and pulses. She wouldnot agree, however much I pleadedwith her, supporting myself withauthorities. At last she challengedme, saying that even I could notgive up these articles if I was ad-vised to do so. I was pained andequally delighted, – delighted inthat I got an opportunity to showermy love on her. I said to her :“You are mistaken. If I was ailingand the doctor advised me to giveup these or any other articles, Ishould unhesitatingly do so. Butthere ! Without any medical ad-vice, I give up salt and pulses forone year, whether you do so ornot.”

She was rudely shocked and ex-

claimed in deep sorrow : “Prayforgive me. Knowing you, I shouldnot have provoked you. I promiseto go without these things, but forheaven's sake take back your vow.This is too hard on me.”

“It is very good for you toforego these articles. I have not theslightest doubt that you will be allthe better without them. As for me,I cannot go back on a vow seri-ously taken. And it is sure to ben-efit me, for all restraint, whateverprompts it, is wholesome for men.You will therefore leave me alone.It will be a test for me, and amoral support to you in carryingout your resolve.”

So she gave me up. “You aretoo obstinate. You will listen tonone,” she said, and sought reliefin tears. I would like to count thisincident as an instance ofSatyagraha, and it is one of thesweetest recollections of my life.After this Kasturba began to pickup quickly.

39. THE ADVENT OF SATYAGRAHA

On return from duty in connec-tion with the Zulu ‘Rebellion’ Imet the friends at Phoenix andreached Johannesburg. Here I readwith deep horror the draft Ordi-

nance published in the TransvaalGovernment Gazette Extraordinaryof August 22, 1906. It meant abso-lute ruin for Indians in South Af-rica. Under it every Indian, man,

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woman or child of eight years orupwards, entitled to reside in theTransvaal, must register his or hername with the Registrar of Asiaticsand take out a certificate ofregristration. The applicants forregistration must surrender theirold permits to the Registrar andstate in their applications theirname, residence, caste, age etc.The Registrar was to note downimportant marks of identificationupon the applicant's person, andtake his finger and thumb impres-sions. Every Indian who failed thusto apply for registration before acertain date was to give up hisright of residence in the Transvaal.Failure to apply would be held tobe an offence in law for which aperson could be fined, sent toprison or even sent away from thecountry. Even a person walking onpublic thorough-fares could be re-quired to produce his certificate.Police officers could enter privatehouses in order to inspect certifi-cates. I have never known legisla-tion of this nature being directedagainst free men in any part of theworld.

The next day there was held asmall meeting of the leading Indi-ans to whom I explained the Ordi-nance word by word. It shockedthem as it had shocked me. Allpresent realized the seriousness of

A Satyagrahi in South Africa

the situation and resolved to hold apublic meeting.

The meeting was duly held onSeptember 11, 1906. The most im-portant among the resolutionspassed by the meeting was the fa-mous Fourth Resolution, by whichthe Indians solemnly determinednot to submit to the Ordinance inthe event of its becoming law inthe teeth of their opposition, and tosuffer all the penalties attaching tosuch non-submission.

None of us knew what name togive to our movement. ShriMaganlal Gandhi suggested theword ‘Sadagraha’ meaning ‘firm-

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ness in a good cause'. I liked theword, but it did not fully representthe whole idea I wished it to con-vey. I therefore corrected it to‘Satyagraha’. Truth (satya) implieslove, and firmness (agraha) bringsabout and therefore serves as a

synonym for force. I thus began tocall the Indian movement‘Satyagraha’, that is to say, theforce which is born of Truth andLove or non-violence, and gave upthe use of the phrase ‘passive re-sistance’, in connection with it.

40. IMPRISONMENT

The officers of the Asiatic De-partment came to think thestrength of the movement couldnot by any means be broken solong as certain leaders were atlarge. So they arrested some of us.

The community had resolved tofill up the jail after our arrests.

We had been in jail for a fort-night, when fresh arrivals broughtthe news that there were going onsome negotiations about a compro-mise with the Government. Thesubstance of the proposed settle-ment was that the Indians should

register voluntarily and that if themajority of the Indians underwentvoluntary registration, Governmentshould repeal the Black Act, as theAsiatic Registration Act came tobe called.

I was taken to Pretoria to meetGeneral Smuts and after discussionwith him of an amendment I hadsuggested, the draft settlement wasaccepted. The prisoners were re-leased and I went about explainingthe terms of the settlement to mycountrymen.

41. ASSAULT

A couple of Pathans were angrywith me for consenting to the giv-ing of finger-prints. It had beenagreed that the leaders should bethe first to take out certificates onthe first day. When I reached myoffice, which was also the office ofthe Satyagraha Association, Ifound Mir Alam, a Pathan, and his

companions standing outside thepremises. Mir Alam was an oldclient of mine, and used to seekmy advice in all his affairs. Hewas fully six feet in height and ofa large and powerful build. Todayfor the first time I saw Mir Alamoutside my office instead of insideit, and although his eyes met mine,

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he for the first time did not saluteme. I saluted him and he salutedme in return. But he did not todaywear his usual smile. I noticed hisangry eyes and took a mental noteof the fact. I thought that some-thing was going to happen. TheChairman, Mr. Yusuf Mian andother friends arrived, and we setout for the Asiatic Office; MirAlam and his companions fol-lowed us.

As we were not more than threeminutes’ walk from the Registra-tion Office, Mir Alam came up tome and asked me, “Where are yougoing ?”

“I propose to take out a certifi-cate of registration, giving the tenfinger-prints.” I replied. “If youwill go with me, I will first getyou a certificate with an impres-sion only of the two thumbs, andthen I will take one for myself,giving the finger-prints.”

I had scarcely finished the lastsentence when a heavy cudgelblow descended on my head frombehind. I at once fainted with thewords He Rama (O God !) on mylips, lay flat on the ground and hadno notion of what followed. ButMir Alam and his companionsgave me more blows and kicks,some of which were warded off byYusuf Mian and Thambi Naidoowith the result that they too were

beaten in their turn. The noise at-tracted some European passers-byto the scene. Mir Alam and hiscompanions fled but were caughtby the Europeans. The police ar-rived in the meanwhile and tookthem away. I was picked up andcarried into Mr. J. C. Gibson's pri-vate office. When I regained con-sciousness, I saw Mr. Doke bend-ing over me. “How do you feel ?”he asked me.

“I am all right,” I replied, “butthere is pain in the teeth and theribs. Where is Mir Alam ?”

“He has been arrested alongwith the rest.”

“They should be released.”“That is all very well. But here

you are in a stranger's office withyour lip and cheek badly torn. Thepolice are ready to take you to thehospital, but if you will go to myplace, Mrs. Doke and I will lookafter you as best we can.”

“Yes, please take me to yourplace. Thank the police for theiroffer but tell them that I prefer togo with you.”

Mr. Chamney, the Registrar ofAsiatic, too now arrived on thescene. I was taken in a carriage tothis good clergy-man's residence inSmit Street and a doctor wascalled in. Meanwhile I said to Mr.Chamney : “I wished to come toyour office, give ten finger-prints

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and take out the first certificate ofregistration, but God willed it oth-erwise. However I have now to re-quest you to bring the papers andallow me to register at once. Ihope that you will not let anyoneelse register before me.”

“Where is the hurry about it ?”asked Mr. Chamney. “The doctorwill be here soon. You please restyourself and all will be well. I willissue certificate to others but keepyour name at the head of the list.”

“Not so,” I replied. “I ampledged to take out the first certifi-cate if I am alive and if it is ac-ceptable to God. It is therefore thatI insist upon the papers beingbrought here and now.”

Upon this Mr. Chamney wentaway to bring the papers.

The second thing for me to dowas to write to the Attorney-Gen-eral that I did not hold Mir Alamand others guilty for the assaultcommitted upon me, that in anycase I did not wish them to beprosecuted and that I hoped theywould be let off for my sake. Butthe Europeans of Johannesburg ad-dressed a strong letter to the Attor-ney-General saying that whateverviews Gandhi might hold as re-gards the punishment of criminals,they could not be given effect to inSouth Africa. Gandhi himself

might not take any steps, but theassault was committed not in a pri-vate place but on the high roadsand was therefore public offence.Several Englishmen too were in aposition to tender evidence and theoffenders must be prosecuted.Upon this the Attorney-General re-arrested Mir Alam and one of hiscompanions who were sentencedto three months' hard labour. OnlyI was not summoned as a witness.

I addressed a short note as fol-lows to the community through theChairman and sent it for publica-tion :

“I am well in the brotherly andsisterly hands of Mr. and Mrs.Doke. I hope to take up my dutyshortly.

“Those who have committed theact did not know what they weredoing. They thought that I was do-ing what was wrong. They havehad their revenge in the only man-ner they know. I therefore requestthat no steps be taken againstthem.”

Mr. Chamney returned with thepapers and I gave my finger-printsbut not without pain. I then sawthat tears stood in Mr. Chamney'seyes. I had often to write bitterlyagainst him, but this showed mehow man's heart may be softenedby events.

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42. RESUMPTION OF SATYAGRAHA

The Indians had registered vol-untarily. The Government were,therefore, on their part to repealthe Black Act. But instead of re-pealing the Black Act, GeneralSmuts maintained the Black Acton the statute book and introducedinto the legislature a measure,‘making further provision for theregistration of Asiatics’: I wasshocked when I read the Bill.

An ‘Ultimatum’ was sent to theGovernment by the Satyagrahis. Itsaid in effect, ”If the Asiatic Act isnot repealed, the certificates col-lected by the Indians would beburnt, and they would humbly butfirmly take the consequences.”

A meeting had been called toperform the public ceremony ofburning the certificates.

As the business of the meetingwas about to commence, a volun-teer arrived on a cycle with a tele-gram from the Government inwhich they regretted the determi-nation of the Indian communityand announced their inability tochange their line of action. Thetelegram was read to the audiencewhich received it with cheers, as ifthey were glad that the auspiciousopportunity of burning the certifi-cates did not after all slip out oftheir hands.

Mir Alam too was present atthis meeting. He announced that hehad done wrong to assault me ashe did, and to the great joy of theaudience, handed his original cer-tificate to be burnt, as he had nottaken a voluntary certificate. I tookhold of his hand, pressed it withjoy, and assured him once morethat I had never had in my mindany resentment against him.

The Committee had already re-ceived upwards of 2,000 certifi-cates to be burnt. These were allthrown into the fire, soaked withkerosene oil and set ablaze by Mr.Yusuf Mian. The whole assemblyrose to their feet and made theplace resound with the echoes oftheir continuous cheers during theburning process. Some of thosewho had still withheld their certifi-cates brought them in numbers tothe platform, and these too werethrown to the flames.

The reporters of English news-papers present at the meeting wereprofoundly impressed with thewhole scene and gave vivid de-scriptions of the meeting in theirpapers.

During the same year in whichthe Black Act was passed GeneralSmuts carried through the Legisla-ture another Bill called the

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Transvaal Immigrants RestrictionBill. This Act indirectly preventedthe entry of a single Indian new-comer into the Transvaal.

It was absolutely essential forthe Indians to resist this fresh in-road on their rights. SeveralSatyagrahis therefore deliberatelyentered the Transvaal and were im-prisoned. I too was arrested again.

Gokhale came to South Africain October 1912 to mediate be-tween the Satyagrahis and theGovernment. General Botha, ac-cording to Gokhale, promised himthat the Black Act would be re-pealed in a year and the £ 3 taxabolished. But this was not done.

I wrote to Gokhale about thebreach of the pledge and set aboutmaking preparations for the ensu-ing campaign.

Till now we had dissuadedwomen from courting imprison-ment. But at this time judgementwas passed by the South AfricanGovernment which made invalidall marriages that had not been cel-ebrated according to Christian ritesand registered by the Registrar ofMarriages. Thus at a stroke of thepen all marriages celebrated ac-cording to Hindu, Mussalman andZoroastrian rites became illegal,and the wives concerned were de-graded to the rank of concubinesand their children deprived of the

right to inherit property. This wasan unbearable situation for womenno less than men.

Patience was impossible in theplace of this insult offered to ourwomanhood. We decided to offerstubborn Satyagraha irrespective ofthe number of fighters. Not onlycould the women now be not pre-vented from joining the struggle,but we decided even to invite themto come into line along with themen.

The women’s imprisonmentworked like a charm upon thelabourers on the mines nearNewcastle who downed their toolsand entered the city in succeedingbatches. As soon as I received thenews, I left Phoenix for Newcastle.

The labourers were not to becounted by tens but by hundreds.And their number might easilyswell into thousands. How was I tohouse and feed this ever growingmultitude? There was a huge gath-ering of men, which was continu-ously increasing. It was a danger-ous if not an impossible task tokeep them in one place and lookafter them while they had no em-ployment. I thought out a solutionof my problem. I must take this‘army’ to the Transvaal and seethem safely deposited in jail. Thestrength of the ‘army’ was aboutfive thousand.

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43. THE TRIUMPH OF SATYAGRAHA

The Union Government had notthe power to keep thousands of in-nocent men in jail. The Viceroywould not tolerate it, and all theworld was waiting to see whatGeneral Smuts would do. TheUnion Government now did whatall governments similarly situatedgenerally do. They get out of suchawkward position by appointing acommission. It is a general practicethat the recommendations of sucha commission should be acceptedby the State, and therefore underthe guise of carrying out the re-commendations, governments givethe justice which they have firstrefused. General Smuts appointeda commission of three members.

I entered into correspondencewith General Smuts over the workof the commission and came toagreement. The commission in itsreport recommended acceptance ofthe demands of the Indian commu-nity; and within a short time afterthe issue of the report, the Govern-ment published in the official Ga-zette of the Union the Indians' Re-lief Bill which abolished the £ 3tax, made legal all marriagesdeemed legal in India, and made adomicile certificate bearing theholder's thumb-print sufficient evi-

Gandhiji and Kasturba :In South Africa, 1913

dence of the right to enter theUnion.

Thus the great Satyagrahastruggle closed after eight years,and it appeared that the Indians inSouth Africa were now at peace.On July 18, 1914, I sailed for En-gland on my way back to India. Itwas difficult for me to leave SouthAfrica, where I had passed twenty-one years of my life sharing to thefull in the sweets and bitters ofhuman experience and where I hadrealized my calling in life.

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PART IX : IN INDIA AND FOUNDING OF THE ASHRAM

44. IN POONA

It was a joy to get back to thehomeland after so many years ofexile.

Gokhale and the members of theServants of India Society* over-whelmed me with affection. So faras I recollect, Gokhale got all ofthem together to meet me. I had afrank talk with them all on everysort of subject.

I wanted to have an Ashramwhere I could settle down with myPhoenix family, preferably some-where in Gujarat, as being aGujarati, I thought I was best fittedto serve the country through serv-ing Gujarat. Gokhale liked theidea. He said: “You should cer-tainly do so. You must look to mefor the expenses of the Ashram,which I will regard as my own.”

My heart overflowed with joy. It

*Founded by Gokhale and consisting of men pledged to devote all their lives to theservice of the country on such allowances as the society may be able to give. Its workcovers many fields - political, social, economic and educational; moderate in politics, itis a non-communal organization which does not recognize caste distinctions. It conductsseveral institutions throughout the country. – Ed.

Arrival in India aftersuccessful Satyagraha

was a pleasure to feel free fromthe responsibility of raising funds.

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The Satyagraha Ashram wasfounded on the 25th of May, 1915at Kochrab in Ahmedabad.

We were in all about twenty-fivemen and women. All had theirmeals in a common kitchen andstrove to live as one family.

The Ashram had been in exist-ence only a few months when wewere put to a test such as I hadscarcely expected. I received a let-ter from Amritlal Thakkar to thiseffect : “A humble and honest un-touchable family is desirous ofjoining your Ashram. Will you ac-cept them ?”

I wrote to Amritlal Thakkar ex-pressing our willingness to acceptthe family, provided all the mem-bers were ready to abide by therules of the Ashram.

They all agreed to abide by therules and were accepted.

But their admission created astir amongst the friends who hadbeen helping the Ashram. The veryfirst difficulty was found with re-gard to the use of the well, whichwas partly controlled by the ownerof the bungalow. The man incharge of the water-lift objectedthat drops of water from ourbucket would pollute him. So hetook to swearing at us. I told ev-eryone to put up with the abuse

45. FOUNDING OF THE ASHRAM

and continue drawing water at anycost. When he saw that we did notreturn his abuse, the man becameashamed and ceased to bother us.

All monetary help, however, wasstopped. With the stopping ofmonetary help came rumours ofproposed social boycott. We wereprepared for all this. I had told mycompanions that, if we were boy-cotted and denied the usual facili-ties, we would not leaveAhmedabad. We would rather goand stay in the ‘untouchables’quarter and live on whatever wecould get by manual labour.

Matters came to such a pass thatMaganlal Gandhi one day gave methis notice : “We are out of fundsand there is nothing for the nextmonth.”

I quietly replied : “Then weshall go to the ‘untouchables’quarter.”

This was not the first time I hadbeen faced with such a trial. On allsuch occasions God has sent helpat the last moment. One morningshortly after Maganlal had givenme warning of our monetaryplight, one of the children cameand said that a Sheth who waswaiting in a car outside wanted tosee me. I went out to him. “I wantto give the Ashram some help.

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Will you accept it ?” he asked.“Most certainly,” said I. “And I

confess I am at the present mo-ment at the end of my resources.”

“I shall come tomorrow at thistime,” he said. “Will you behere ?”

“Yes,” said I, and he left.Next day, exactly at the ap-

pointed hour, the car drew up nearour quarters, and the horn wasblown. The children came with thenews. The Sheth did not come in. I

went out to see him. He placed inmy hands currency notes of thevalue of Rs. 13,000 and drove away.

I had never expected this help,and what a novel way of renderingit! The gentleman had never beforevisited the Ashram. So far as I canremember, I had met him onlyonce. No visit, no enquiries, sim-ply rendering help and goingaway! This was a unique experi-ence for me. We now felt quitesafe for a year.

PART X : CHAMPARAN

46. THE STAIN OF INDIGO

The Champaran tenant wasbound by law to plant three out ofevery twenty parts of his land withindigo for his landlord. This sys-tem was known as tinkathia systemas, three kathas out of twenty(which make one acre) had to beplanted with indigo.

Rajkumar Shukla was one of theagriculturists who had suffered un-der this system. He wanted mepersonally to visit Champaran andsee the miseries of the ryots there.

So early in 1917 we leftCalcutta for Champaran. My objectwas to inquire into the condition ofthe Champaran agriculturists andunderstand their grievances againstthe indigo planters. For this pur-

pose it was necessary that I shouldmeet thousands of the ryots. But Ithought it essential, before startingon my inquiry, to know the plant-ers' side of the case and see theCommissioner of the Division. Isought and was granted appoint-ments with both.

The Secretary of the Planters'Association told me plainly that Iwas an outsider and that I had nobusiness to come between theplanters and their tenants, but if Ihad any representation to make, Imight submit it in writing. I po-litely told him that I did not regardmyself as an outsider, and that Ihad every right to inquire into thecondition of the tenants if they de-

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sired me to do so.The Commissioner, on whom I

called, advised me forthwith toleave Tirhut.

I acquainted my co-workers withall this, and told them that therewas a likelihood of Governmentstopping me from proceeding fur-ther, and that I might have to go tojail earlier than I had expected, andthat, if I was to be arrested, itwould be best that the arrestshould take place in Motihari or ifpossible in Bettiah. It was advis-able, therefore, that I should go tothose places as early as possible.

Champaran is a district of theTirhut division in Bihar, andMotihari is its headquarters.Rajkumar Shukla's place was inthe vicinity of Bettiah, and the ten-ants in its neighbourhood were thepoorest in the district. RajkumarShukla wanted me to see them andI was equally anxious to do so.

So I started with my co-workersfor Motihari the same day. Thevery same day we heard that aboutfive miles from Motihari a tenanthad been ill-treated. It was decidedthat, in company with BabuDharanidhar Prasad, I should goand see him the next morning, andwe accordingly set off for theplace on elephant's back. We hadscarcely gone half way when amessenger from the Police Super-

intendent overtook us and said thatthe latter had sent his compli-ments. I saw what he meant. Hav-ing left Dharanidhar Babu to pro-ceed to the original destination, Igot into the hired carriage whichthe messenger had brought. Hethen served on me a notice toleave Champaran, and drove me tomy place. On his asking me to ac-knowledge the service of the no-tice, I wrote to the effect that I didnot propose to leave Champarantill my inquiry was finished.Thereupon I received a summonsto take my trial the next day fordisobeying the order to leaveChamparan.

The news of the notice and thesummons spread like wildfire, andI was told that Motihari that daywitnessed unprecedented scenes.Gorakhbabu's house and the court-house overflowed with men. Fortu-nately I had finished all my workduring the night and so was able tomanage the crowds. My compan-ions proved the greatest help. Theyoccupied themselves with regulat-ing the crowds, for the latter fol-lowed me wherever I went.

A sort of friendliness sprang upbetween the officials – Collector,Magistrate, Police Superintendent– and myself. I might have legallyresisted the notices served on me.Instead I accepted them all, and

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my conduct towards the officialswas correct. They thus saw that Idid not want to offend them per-sonally, but that I wanted to offercivil resistance to their orders. Inthis way they were put at ease, andinstead of harassing me they gladlyavailed themselves of my and myco-workers' co-operation in regu-lating the crowds. But it was a vis-ible demonstration to them of thefact that their authority wasshaken. The people had for themoment lost all fear of punishmentand yielded obedience to thepower of love which their newfriends exercised.

It should be remembered that noone knew me in Champaran. Andyet they received me as though wehad been age-long friends. It is noexaggeration, but the literal truth,to say that in this meeting with thepeasants I was face to face withGod, Ahimsa, and Truth.

That day in Champaran was anunforgettable event in my life anda red-letter day for the peasantsand for me.

The trial began. The Govern-ment pleader, the Magistrate andother officials were at a loss toknow what to do.

Before I could appear before theCourt to receive the sentence, theMagistrate sent a written messagethat the Lieutenant Governor hadordered the case against me to bewithdrawn, and the Collector wroteto me saying that I was at libertyto conduct the proposed inquiry,and that I might count on whateverhelp I needed from the officials.None of us was prepared for thisprompt and happy issue.

Crowds of peasants came tomake their statements, and theywere followed by an army of com-panions who filled the compoundand garden to over-flowing.

47. THE STAIN REMOVED

The ever growing number ofryots coming to make their state-ments increased the planters'wrath, and they moved heavenand earth to put an end to myinquiry.

But Sir Edward Gait, the Lieu-tenant Governor, asked me to seehim, expressed his willingness to

appoint an inquiry and invitedme to be a member of the Com-mittee.

The Committee voted in favourof the ryots, and recommendedthat the planters should refund aportion of the exactions made bythem which the Committee hadfound to be unlawful, and that

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the tinkathia system should beabolished by law.

The tinkathia system which had

been in existence for about a cen-tury was thus abolished, and withit the planters’ raj came to an end.

PART XI : AHMEDABAD LABOUR

48. IN TOUCH WITH LABOUR

At this time there came a letterfrom Shrimati Anasuyabehn aboutthe condition of labour inAhmedabad. Wages were low, thelabourers had long been agitatingfor an increment, and I had a de-sire to guide them if I could. So Iwent to Ahmedabad.

I was in a most delicate situa-tion. The mill-hands' case wasstrong. Shrimati Anasuyabehn hadto battle against her own brother,Shri Ambalal Sarabhai, who ledthe fight on behalf of the mill-owners. My relations with themwere friendly, and that made fight-ing with them the more difficult. Iheld consultations with them, andrequested them to refer the disputeto arbitration, but they refused torecognize the principle of arbitra-tion.

I had therefore to advise thelabourers to go on strike. Before Idid so, I came in very close con-tact with them and their leaders,and explained to them the condi-tions of a successful strike:

1. never to resort to violence,

2. never to molest blacklegs,3. never to depend upon alms,

and4. to remain firm, no matter how

long the strike continued, and toearn bread, during the strike, byany other honest labour.

The leaders of the strike under-stood and accepted the conditions,and the labourers pledged them-selves at a general meeting not toresume work until either theirterms were accepted or the mill-owners agreed to refer the disputeto arbitration.

For the first two weeks the mill-hands exhibited great courage andself-restraint and daily held largemeetings. On these occasions Iused to remind them of theirpledge, and they would shout backto me the assurance that theywould rather die than break theirword.

But later they began to showsigns of weakening. I felt deeplytroubled and began thinking hardas to what my duty was in the cir-cumstances.

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One morning – it was at a mill-hands' meeting – while I was stillgroping and unable to see my wayclearly, the light came to me. Un-bidden and all by themselves thewords came to my lips : “Unlessthe strikers rally,” I declared to themeeting, “and continue the striketill a settlement is reached, or tillthey leave the mills altogether, Iwill not touch any food.”

The labourers werethunderstruck. Tears began tocourse down Anasuyabehn'scheeks. The labourers broke out,“Not you but we shall fast. Itwould be monstrous if you were tofast. Please forgive us for ourlapse, we will now remain faithfulto our pledge to the end.”

“There is no need for you tofast,” I replied. “It would beenough if you could remain true toyour pledge. As you know we arewithout funds, and we do not wantto continue our strike by living onpublic charity. You should there-fore try to earn your bare living bysome kind of labour, so that you

may be able to remain uncon-cerned, no matter how long thestrike may continue. As for myfast, it will be broken only afterthe strike is settled.”

Anasuyabehn and a number ofother friends and labourers sharedthe fast with me on the first day.But after some difficulty I wasable to dissuade them from con-tinuing it further.

The net result of it was that anatmosphere of goodwill was cre-ated all round. The hearts of themill-owners were touched, andthey set about discovering somemeans for a settlement.Anasuyabehn's house became themeeting place for their discussions.Shri Anandshankar Dhruva inter-vened and was in the end ap-pointed arbitrator, and the strikewas called off after I had fastedonly for three days. The mill-own-ers commemorated the event bydistributing sweets among thelabourers, and thus a settlementwas reached after 21 days’ strike.

PART XII : THE KHEDA SATYAGRAHA

49. THE KHEDA SATYAGRAHA

No breathing time was, how-ever, in store for me. Hardly wasthe Ahmedabad mill-hands' strike

over, when I had to plunge into theKheda Satyagraha struggle.

A condition approaching famine

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had arisen in the Kheda districtowing to a widespread failure ofcrops, and the Patidars of Khedawere considering the question ofgetting the Government not to col-lect its land revenue for the year.

Under the Land Revenue Rules,if the crop was four annas* or un-der, the cultivators could claim fullsuspension of payment of revenuefor the year. According to the offi-cial figures the crop was said to beover four annas. The contention ofthe cultivators, on the other hand,was that it was less than fourannas. But the Government was inno mood to listen. At last all peti-tioning and prayer having failed,after taking counsel with co-work-ers, I advised the Patidars to resortto Satyagraha.

In the initial stages, though thepeople exhibited much courage,the Government did not seem in-clined to take strong action. But asthe people's firmness showed nosigns of wavering, the Governmentbegan coercion. The attachment of-ficers sold people's cattle andseized whatever movables theycould lay hands on. Penalty noticeswere served, and in some casesstanding crops were attached.

With a view to steeling thehearts of those who were fright-

ened, I advised the people, underthe leadership of Shri MohanlalPandya, to remove the crop of on-ion from a field which had been,in my opinion, wrongly attached.This was a good opportunity forthe people to learn a lesson incourting fines or imprisonment,which was the necessary conse-quence of such disobedience. ForShri Mohanlal Pandya it was athing after his heart. So he volun-teered to remove the onion cropfrom the field, and in this seven oreight friends joined him.

*i.e. four annas in the rupee (16 annas), or one-fourth the normal.

Kheda Satyagraha : 1918

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It was impossible for the Gov-ernment to leave them free. Thearrest of Shri Mohanlal and hiscompanions added to the people'senthusiasm. When the fear of jaildisappears, repression puts heartinto the people.

A procession escorted the ‘con-victs’ to jail, and on that day ShriMohanlal Pandya earned from thepeople the honoured title of`dunglichor (onion thief) which he enjoysto this day.

I was looking for some gracefulway of ending the struggle whichwould be acceptable to aSatyagrahi. Such a one appearedquite unexpectedly. The Mamlatdarof the Nadiad Taluka sent me wordthat, if well-to-do Patidars paid up,the poorer ones would be permit-ted not to pay. I asked for a writtenundertaking to that effect, whichwas given. I inquired of the Col-lector, who alone could give an

undertaking in respect of the wholedistrict, whether the Mamlatdar'sundertaking was true for the wholedistrict. He replied that orders interms of the Mamlatdar's letter hadbeen already issued. I was notaware of it, but if it was a fact, thepeople's pledge had been fulfilled.The pledge, it will be remembered,had the same thing for its object,and so we expressed ourselves sat-isfied with the orders.

The Kheda Satyagraha marksthe beginning of an awakeningamong the peasants of Gujarat, thebeginning of their true politicaleducation. The lesson becamefirmly impressed on the publicmind that the salvation of thepeople depends upon themselves,upon the capacity for suffering andsacrifice. Through the Kheda cam-paign Satyagraha took firm root inthe soil of Gujarat.

50. NEAR DEATH’S DOOR

In those days my food princi-pally consisted of groundnut butterand lemons. I knew that it waspossible to eat too much butter andinjure one's health, and yet I al-lowed myself to do so. This gaveme a slight attack of dysentery.

There was some festival thatday, and although I had told

Kasturba that I should have noth-ing for my midday meal, shetempted me and I yielded. As Iwas under a vow of taking no milkor milk products, she had speciallyprepared for me a sweet wheatporridge with oil added to it in-stead of ghee. She had reservedtoo a bowlful of mung for me. I

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was fond of these things, and Ireadily took them, hoping thatwithout coming to grief I shouldeat just enough to please Kasturbaand to satisfy my palate. But thedevil had been only waiting for anopportunity. Instead of eating verylittle I had my fill of the meal.This was sufficient invitation tothe angel of death. Within an hourthe dysentery appeared in acuteform.

I would take no medicine, butpreferred to suffer the penalty formy folly. I must have had thirty toforty motions in twenty-four hours.I fasted, not taking even fruitjuices in the beginning. The appe-tite had all gone, I felt that I wasat death's door.

Whilst I lay thus ever expectantof death, Shankerlal Bankar consti-tuted himself the guardian of myhealth, and pressed me to consultDr. Dalal. Dr. Dalal was called ac-cordingly. His capacity for takinginstantaneous decisions capturedme.

He said : “I cannot rebuild yourbody unless you take milk. If inaddition you would take iron andarsenic injections, I would guaran-tee fully to make you well.”

“You can give me the injec-tions,” I replied, “but milk is a dif-ferent question; I have a vowagainst it.”

“What exactly is the nature ofyour vow ?” the doctor inquired.

I told him the whole history andthe reasons behind my vow, how,since I had come to know that thecow and the buffalo were sub-jected to the process of phuka, Ihad taken a strong disgust formilk. Moreover, I had always heldthat milk is not the natural diet ofman. I had therefore given up itsuse altogether. Kasturba was stand-ing near my bed listening all thetime to this conversation.

“But surely you cannot have anyobjection to goat's milk then,” shesaid.

The doctor added : “If you willtake goat's milk, it will be enoughfor me.”

I gave in. My intense eagernessto take up the Satyagraha fight hadcreated in me a strong desire tolive, and so I contended myselfwith adhering to the letter of myvow only, and sacrificed its spirit.For although I had only the milkof the cow and the she-buffalo inmind when I took the vow, bynatural implication it covered themilk of all animals. Nor could itbe right for me to use milk at all,so long as I held that milk is notthe natural diet of man. Yet know-ing all this I agreed to take goat'smilk. The memory of this actioneven now fills me with remorse,

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and I am constantly thinking howto give up goat's milk. But I can-not yet free myself from that sub-tlest of temptations, the desire toserve, which still holds me.

Soon after I began taking goat's

milk, Dr. Dalal performed on me asuccessful operation. As I was get-ting better, my desire to live re-vived, especially because God hadkept work in store for me.

PART XIII : THE ROWLATT ACT ANDENTRANCE INTO POLITICS

51. THE ROWLATT ACT*

I had hardly begun to feel myway towards recovery, when I hap-pened casually to read in the pa-pers the Rowlatt Committee's re-port which had just been pub-lished. Its recommendationsstartled me. I mentioned my appre-hensions to Vallabhbhai, who usedto come to see me almost daily.“Something must be done,” said Ito him. “But what can we do inthe circumstances?' he asked in re-ply. I answered, “If even a handfulof men can be found to sign thepledge of resistance, and the pro-posed measure is passed into lawin defiance of it, we ought to offerSatyagraha at once. If I was notlaid up like this, I should givebattle against it all alone, and ex-pect others to follow suit. But in

my present helpless condition Ifeel myself to be altogether un-equal to the task.”

The Bill had not yet beengazetted as an Act. I was in a veryweak condition, but when I re-ceived an invitation from Madras Idecided to take the risk of the longjourney. Rajagopalachari had thenonly recently left Salem to settledown for legal practice in Madras.We daily discussed together plansof the fight, but beyond the hold-ing of public meetings I could notthen think of any otherprogramme.

While we were engaged thus,news was received that the RowlattBill had been published as an Act.That night I fell asleep whilethinking over the question. To-

*This act was passed in 1919 to provide special powers to the Government tosuppress movements aimed against the State. It authorised arrest and detention, withouttrial, of persons suspected of anti-government activities. – Ed.

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wards the small hours of the morn-ing I woke up somewhat earlierthan usual. I was still in that twi-light condition between sleep andconsciousness when suddenly theidea came to me – it was as if in adream. Early in the morning I re-lated the whole story toRajagopalachari.

“The idea came to me last nightin a dream that we should callupon the country to observe a gen-eral hartal. Satyagraha is a processof self-purification, and ours is asacred fight, and it seems to me tobe in the fitness of things that itshould be begun with an act ofself-purification. Let all the peopleof India, therefore, stop their busi-ness on that day and observe theday as one of fasting and prayer.”

Rajagopalachari was at oncetaken up with my suggestion.Other friends too welcomed itwhen it was communicated tothem later. I drafted a brief appeal.The date of the hartal was firstfixed on the 30th March 1919, butwas later changed to 6th April.

The whole of India from oneend to the other, towns as well asvillages, observed a completehartal on that day. It was a mostwonderful sight.

On the night of the 7th I started

for Delhi and Amritsar. Before thetrain had reached Palwal railwaystation, I was served with a writtenorder to the effect that I was pro-hibited from entering the boundaryof the Punjab, as my presencethere was likely to result in a dis-turbance of the peace. I was askedby the police to get down from thetrain. I refused to do so saying, “Iwant to go to the Punjab in re-sponse to a pressing invitation, notto foment unrest, but to end it. Iam therefore sorry that it is notpossible for me to comply withthis order.”

At Palwal railway station I wastaken out of the train and put un-der police custody. A train fromDelhi came in a short time. I wasmade to enter a third class car-riage, the police party accompany-ing. On reaching Mathura, I wastaken to the police barracks, but nopolice official could tell me as towhat they proposed to do with meor where I was to be taken next.Early at 4 o'clock the next morn-ing, I was waked up and put in agoods train that was going towardsBombay. I was released atBombay.

There was a great disturbance inthe city owing to my arrest. I gotinto the car. Near Pydhuni* I saw

*a part of Bombay city

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that a huge crowd had gathered.On seeing me the people went madwith joy. A procession was imme-diately formed, and the sky wasrent with the shouts of VandeMataram and Allaho Akbar. AtPydhuni we sighted a body ofmounted police. Brickbats wereraining down from above. I ap-pealed to the crowd to be calm butit seemed as if we should not beable to escape the shower of brick-bats. As the procession came outof Abdur Rahman Street and wasabout to move towards theCrawford Market, it suddenlyfound itself faced with a body ofthe mounted police, who had ar-rived there to prevent it from pro-ceeding further in the direction ofthe Fort. The crowd was denselypacked. It had almost brokenthrough the police cordon. Therewas hardly any chance of my voicebeing heard in that vast assembly.Just then the officer in charge ofthe mounted police gave the orderto disperse the crowd, and at oncethe mounted party charged uponthe crowd brandishing their lancesas they went. For a moment I feltthat I would be hurt. But my fearwas groundless, the lances justgrazed the car as the lancersswiftly passed by. The ranks of thepeople were soon broken, and theywere thrown into utter confusion,

and began to run. Some gottrampled under foot, others werebadly hurt and crushed. In thatseething mass of humanity therewas hardly any room for the horsesto pass, nor was there any exit bywhich the people could disperse.So the lancers blindly cut theirway through the crowd. I hardlyimagine they could see what theywere doing. The whole thing pre-sented a most dreadful spectacle.The horsemen and the people weremixed together in mad confusion.

Thus the crowd was dispersed andits progress checked. Our motor wasallowed to proceed. I had it stoppedbefore the Commissioner's office,and got down to complain to himabout the conduct of the police.

News came of disturbances inAhmedabad also. I proceeded toAhmedabad. I learnt that an at-tempt had been made to pull upthe rails near the Nadiad railwaystation, that a Government officerhad been murdered in Viramgam,and that Ahmedabad was undermartial law. The people were ter-ror-stricken. They had indulged inacts of violence and were beingmade to pay for them with interest.

A police officer was waiting atthe station to escort me to Mr.Pratt, the Commissioner. I foundhim in a state of rage. I spoke tohim gently, and expressed my re-

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gret for the disturbances. I sug-gested that martial law was unnec-essary, and declared my readinessto co-operate in all efforts to re-store peace. I asked for permissionto hold a public meeting on thegrounds of the Sabarmati Ashram.The proposal appealed to him, andthe meeting was held, I think, onSunday, the 13th of April, andmartial law was withdrawn thesame day or the day after. Address-ing the meeting, I tried to bringhome to the people the sense oftheir wrong, declared a penitentialfast of three days for myself, ap-

pealed to the people to go on asimilar fast for a day, and sug-gested to those who had beenguilty of acts of violence to con-fess their guilt.

I saw my duty as clear as day-light. It was unbearable for me tofind that the labourers, amongstwhom I had spent a good deal ofmy time, whom I had served andfrom whom I had expected betterthings, had taken part in the riots; Ifelt I was a sharer in their guilt.

I made up my mind to suspendSatyagraha so long as people hadnot learnt the lesson of peace.

PART XIV : THE BIRTH OF KHADI

52. THE BIRTH OF KHADI

When the Satyagraha Ashramwas founded at Sabarmati, we in-troduced a few handlooms there.

The object that we in theAshram set before ourselves wasto be able to clothe ourselves en-tirely in cloth manufactured by ourown hands. We therefore forthwithgave up the use of mill-wovencloth, and all the members of theAshram resolved to wear hand-woven cloth made from Indianyarn only. By thus adopting clothwoven from mill-yarn as our wear,and propagating it among ourfriends, we made ourselves volun-

tary agents of the Indian spinningmills. This in its turn brought usinto contact with the mills. Wesaw that the aim of the mills wasmore and more to weave the yarnspun by them; their co-operationwith the handloom weaver was notwilling, but unavoidable and tem-porary. We became impatient to beable to spin our own yarn. It wasclear that until we could do thisourselves, dependence on the millswould remain. We did not feel thatwe could render any service to thecountry by continuing as agents ofIndian spinning mills.

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We could get neither a spinningwheel nor a spinner to teach ushow to spin.

I asked every chance visitor tothe Ashram, who was likely topossess some information abouthand-spinning, about the art.

In the year 1917 I was taken bymy Gujarati friends to preside atthe Broach Educational Confer-ence. It was here that I discoveredthat remarkable lady GangabehnMajmudar. To her I poured out mygrief about the charkha, and shelightened my burden by a promiseto search for the spinning wheeltill she found it.

At last after no end of wander-ing in Gujarat, Gangabehn foundthe spinning wheel in Vijapur inthe Baroda State. Quite a numberof people there had spinningwheels in their homes, but hadlong since put them away as use-less lumber. They expressed toGangabehn their readiness to re-sume spinning, if someone prom-ised to provide them with a regularsupply of slivers, and to buy theyarn spun by them. Gangabehn

53. FAREWELL

communicated the joyful news tome. The providing of slivers wasfound to be a difficult task. On mymentioning the thing to the lateUmar Sobani, he solved the diffi-culty by immediately undertakingto send a sufficient supply of sliv-ers from his mill.

I did not like continuously re-ceiving slivers from him. More-over, it seemed to me to be funda-mentally wrong to use mill-slivers.If one could use mill-slivers, whynot use mill-yarn as well? Surelyno mills supplied slivers to the an-cients. How did they make theirslivers then? With these thoughtsin my mind I suggested toGangabehn to find carders whocould supply slivers. She confi-dently undertook the task. She en-gaged a carder who was preparedto card cotton. He demandedthirty-five rupees, if not muchmore, per month. I considered noprice too high at the time. Shetrained a few youngsters to makeslivers out of the carded cotton.Thus the spinning wheel gained arapid footing in the Ashram.

The time has now come to bringthese chapters to a close.

My life from this point onwardhas been so public that there is

hardly anything about it thatpeople do not know.

In fact my pen instinctively re-fuses to proceed further.

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It is not without regret that Ihave to take leave of the reader.I set a high value on my experi-ments. I do not know whether Ihave been able to do justice tothem. I can only say that I havespared no pains to give a faith-

ful narrative. To describe truth as ithas appeared to me, has been myceaseless effort. The exercise hasgiven me great mental peace, be-cause it has been my fond hopethat it might bring faith in Truthand Ahimsa to waverers.

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CHAPTER 1

1. Describe in your own words the reli-gious devotion of Gandhiji's mother.

CHAPTER 2

1. Narrate incidents in Gandhiji'sschool-life which illustrate his love oftruth.

2. What made Gandhiji speciallyfond of the story of Shravana and ofHarishchandra ? Relate what you knowof these stories.

3. Gandhiji attached more value tocharacter than to cleverness at books.Do you think he was right? Why ?

4. “A man of truth must be a man ofcare”, says Gandhiji. Explain Gandhiji'smeaning from the context.

CHAPTER 3

1. Describe in your own words theearly married life of Gandhiji andKasturba.

CHAPTER 4

1. What reasons led Gandhiji to thinkthat meat-eating was good?

2. What made him give up meat-eat-ing?

3. One has to be careful about makingfriends. Why? Illustrate from Gandhiji'sexperience narrated in this chapter.

CHAPTER 5

1. Relate Gandhiji's experience in re-gard to smoking.

2. What was the effect of Gandhiji'sconfession (a) on Gandhiji's father, and(b) on Gandhiji himself? Explain givingyour own reasons.

3. Why did Gandhiji want to commitsuicide and why did he give up the idea?

CHAPTER 6

1. In what various ways did Gandhijiserve his sick father?

CHAPTER 7

1. In what way had Gandhiji's nurse,Rambha, helped Gandhiji? How could heradvice help him in later life also?

2. What was Gandhiji's attitude to theRamayana, and how did he come to havesuch an attitude early in his life?

3. What was his early attitude to vari-ous religions and why?

4. Did he maintain this attitudethroughout his life? Illustrate from whatyou know of his public prayers and otheractivities.

5. What, according to Gandhiji, wasthe essence of religion, which he thoughthe must put into practice at all times? Canyou illustrate what he meant as overagainst the view that religion consists (a)in going to temples or observing ceremo-nies and traditions, or (b) in believing in aparticular creed?

CHAPTER 8

1. Narrate the difficulties whichGandhiji had before he could leave forEngland.

CHAPTER 9

1. What difficulties did Gandhiji haveon the ship?

2. What is the meaning of convention?In what way did Gandhiji go against Brit-ish convention, when he arrived in En-gland (a) in regard to dress, (b) food, and(c) manners ?

CHAPTER 10

1. State the difficulties Gandhiji had in

TOPICS FOR ESSAYS

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regard to vegetarian food in London, andhow he became a vegetarian by choice.

CHAPTER 11

1. In what various ways did Gandhijitry to become an English Gentleman?

2. What made him give up the attempt?3. What should be our attitude to West-

ern culture, for instance, in regard to (a)clothes, (b) smoking and drinking, (c) re-lation between the sexes, (d) sanitationand public cleanliness, (e) punctuality, (f)business honesty, and (g) group disci-pline? Point out anything else Westernwhich we should adopt or discard.

CHAPTER 12

1. Show how careful Gandhiji was inregard to the use of money, and how hetried to economize while he was a studentin London.

2. Comment on `Taste depends moreon one's attitude of mind than on thetongue'. Illustrate from Gandhiji's experi-ence.

3. What changes did Gandhiji intro-duce in his diet? Why?

4. Gandhiji believed that our foodshould be for keeping our bodies inhealth, and not for pleasing our taste. Dis-cuss, giving your views.

CHAPTER 13

1. In what way was Gandhiji's shynesshis "shield'? Explain how shyness can bean advantage, if possible from your ownexperience.

CHAPTER 14

1. What teaching of the Gita appealedto Gandhiji most? What does this teachingmean? Illustrate from your own experi-ence.

2. What is the Bible? Who preachedthe Sermon on the Mount? What teachingof the Sermon on the Mount appealed to

Gandhiji greatly?3. What lessons could Gandhiji have

learnt from the life and message of theBuddha? Write from what you know ofthe Buddha.

CHAPTER 15

1. How did Gandhiji win over his castefellows who had out-casted him? Wouldthe method of agitating against them havehelped?

2. From this, what conclusion do youdraw as to the more effective way ofovercoming opposition } through kindnessand courtesy or through retaliation andhate?

3. Describe Gandhiji's first appearancein court as a lawyer.

CHAPTER 16

1. Relate in your own words Gandhiji'sunpleasant experience with the British Po-litical Agent at Porbandar.

2. What were the circumstances whichled Gandhiji to leave India and go toSouth Africa?

CHAPTER 17

1. What were Gandhiji's first impres-sions as soon as he reached South Africa?

CHAPTER 18

1. Describe Gandhiji's first train jour-ney in South Africa from Durban toMaritzburg.

2. Relate Gandhiji's experience on thestage-coach between Charlestown andStanderton, and his train journey fromJohannesburg to Pretoria.

CHAPTER 19

1. Narrate incidents in Gandhiji's life inconnection with securing hotel accommo-dation in South Africa including also mat-ter from the previous chapter.

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CHAPTER 20

1. What were the disabilities underwhich Indians suffered in the Transvaal?

2. Describe the assault on Gandhiji forwalking on the footpath in Pretoria.

CHAPTER 21

1. What method did Gandhiji prefer indealing with legal disputes? Why? Whatis the meaning of coming to a compro-mise? Illustrate.

CHAPTER 22

1. What made Gandhiji give up hisplan to return to India after he had fin-ished his work in the Abdulla case?

CHAPTER 23

1. What is the meaning of ‘indenturedlabour ’ ?

2. What was the £ 3 tax, and why wasit levied on indentured Indians ?

CHAPTER 24

1. What did Gandhiji do to educatepublic opinion in India about the ill-treat-ment of Indians in South Africa ?

CHAPTER 25

1. What is quarantine ? Why is it insti-tuted ?

2. What were the reasons for theWhites agitating against Gandhiji's returnto South Africa?

3. Describe Gandhiji's stormy arrival inDurban.

4. What made the Whites give up theiropposition to Gandhiji in the end ?

CHAPTER 26

1. Describe Gandhiji's efforts to washhis own clothes and cut his own hair.

2. Write an essay on the dignity andadvantage of manual labour.

3. Explain Gandhiji's statement that he

regarded racial discrimination practisedagainst Indians in South Africa as a pun-ishment for our own unjust treatment of‘untouchables’.

4. What do you think we should do toimprove the lot of the ‘untouchables ' ?

CHAPTER 27

1. Describe Gandhiji's quarrel withKasturba over her not cleaning the pot ofthe ‘untouchable’ guest.

2. What lesson do you learn from thisin regard to forcing people to do theright? What should we do to obtain theirco-operation ?

CHAPTER 28

1. In what way did Gandhiji help theBritish in the Boer War? Why did he helpthem ?

CHAPTER 29

1. What were the reasons which ledGandhiji not to accept costly gifts forhimself ?

2. Do you agree with Gandhiji in hisdisapproval of jewellery? Give reasons forand against the use of jewellery.

CHAPTER 30

1. Narrate Gandhiji's experience at thefirst Congress which he attended.

CHAPTER 33

1. Relate how Gandhiji memorized theGita.

2. What effect did the Gita teachingabout non-possession have on Gandhiji ?

CHAPTER 34

1. Explain in your own words what les-sons Gandhiji learnt from Ruskin's UntoThis Last.

2. From what you may know of

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Gandhiji’s later activities show in whatvarious ways he put these lessons intopractice ?

CHAPTER 36

1. What help did Gandhiji render at thetime of the Zulu Rebellion ?

2. Can it be said that his work at thattime and during the Boer War trained himfor later work? In what way? Relate fromwhat you know of his work in hisAshrams.

CHAPTER 37

1. Narrate the story of how Kasturbarefused to take beef tea, and Gandhiji'spart in it.

CHAPTER 38

1. If Satyagraha means inviting suffer-ing on oneself for the sake of convertingthe opponent, show how Gandhiji'smethod of getting Kasturba to give up saltand pulses was a case of Satyagraha.

2. Have you ever practised suchSatyagraha yourself, and with what suc-cess ?

CHAPTER 39

1. What led Gandhiji to give the nameSatyagraha to his movement of non-vio-lent resistance? Why did he give up theold name, passive resistance, for it ?

CHAPTER 40

1. What form did Satyagraha takeagainst the Asiatic Registration Act, andwhat compromise was effected as the re-sult of it ?

CHAPTER 41

1. Describe the assault on Gandhiji byMir Alam.

2. Why did Gandhiji not want MirAlam to be punished? What effect, do youthink, Gandhiji's forgiveness would have

had on him ?

CHAPTER 42

1. What made Gandhiji resumeSatyagraha against the Asiatic RegistrationAct ?

2. Describe in your own words whattook place at the burning of the certifi-cates ?

3. In what ways did Gandhiji intensifyhis campaign till finally the Governmenthad to come to terms ?

4. Enumerate the various stages in thecampaign.

CHAPTER 45

1. State the difficulties Gandhiji had inadmitting ‘untouchables’ to his Ashram.How did he overcome them?

2. Is it wrong to practise untouchabilityin the form of non-mixing of castes andcommunities ? Why ?

3. What should we do to bring about afeeling of oneness between (a) all thecastes, (b) creeds, and (c) languages ofIndia ?

4. Enumerate what you can do in yourhome towards these ends.

CHAPTER 47

1. Describe how Gandhiji managed toabolish the indigo planters’ raj inChamparan.

2. Study his procedure from the pointof view of Satyagraha (or exercising theforce of Truth and Love), and show howthis method led to success.

CHAPTER 48

1. Enumerate in your own words how,according to Gandhiji, a labour strikeshould be conducted.

2. Why did Gandhiji fast in connectionwith the Ahmedabad strike?

3. In what ways did the fast help tobring the dispute to a peaceful end?

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4. Show how the fast was a case ofSatyagraha.

CHAPTER 49

1. Relate the story of the KhedaSatyagraha.

CHAPTER 50

1. Relate fully how Gandhiji came totake goat's milk.

2. If we are not to be cruel to cows,one of the ways is not to slaughter them.Can you enumerate other ways by whichwe can save or protect the cow?

CHAPTER 51

1. Gandhiji started his Satyagraha cam-paign against the Rowlatt Act with ahartal and later suspended the movement.Can you give reasons justifying these

moves on the part of Gandhiji, from thepoint of view conforming to the condi-tions of true Satyagraha ?

2. From the instances of Satyagrahanarrated in this book, can you frame foryourself the main requirements for a trueSatyagraha?

CHAPTER 52

1. Relate the difficulties Gandhiji hadin starting hand-spinning and carding inhis Ashram.

2. Why did Gandhiji insist on hand-spinning and weaving? Why was he notcontent with mill manufacture of cloth ?

3. Enumerate the advantages and dis-advantages of cottage industries versusmill industries, and state your opinionas to which is preferable for our coun-try.

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