It is that time of the year when we are flooded with thoughts of the man who brought down an empire while giving us our freedom. What Albert Einstein said of him on his 70th birthday—“Generations to come, it may well be, will scarce believe that such a man as this one ever in flesh and blood walked up-on this Earth” — still reverberates with a distinct awesomeness almost 70 years after his death at the hands of assassins. Two years ago they erected a statue in London’s Parliament Square to the man who took on the Empire upon which, once upon a time, the Sun never set.
It is a tribute to history — which he helped reshape while giving us the freedoms we have learnt to cherish in 70 years — his statue should be very close to the seat of British power. The one statute there is a counterpoint to the many relics of the Empire that are still standing in our cities, like the magnificent one of Lord Thomas Munro, astride his horse though without stirrups, plumb in the middle of Mount Road at the T junction not far from Central Station.
The Munro statue stands while that of the “Bucher of Allahabad”— Colonel James George Smith Neil —which used to be in front of Spencers was removed to the Museum after 10 years of satyagraha, in 1937. The British Army was a symbol of oppression and Neil was a particularly poor specimen as he massacred sepoys in 1857, thought of as the first war for Indian freedom though the British called it “sepoy mutiny”, though many are said to have pr-edated it like the Vellore Fort mutiny. Munro stays on Mount Road as he was a man of vision who helped shape an administration in India in which Indians played a big role.
The wisdom to know the difference between benevolent rule and sadistic oppression in imperial India is to be appreciated, as much as the broader mindset that has allowed England to now honour Gandhi, albeit belatedly. But then we may need the same broad vision to accept that Gandhi is not universally loved even in the land of his birth and in the very country he freed and to which he gave birth with his unique movement of non-violence.
It is almost a rite of the passage of time that Richard Attenborough’s lyrical tribute to the life of the Mahatma should rerun every October 2, to commemorate his birthday. It is, however, a recorded fact that in Gujarat, the very soil on which he was born, some people have been known to break into wild applause when the killer pumps bullets into Gandhi towards the end of the film and he utters the now famous last words of “Hey Ram!” It took a British director to make such a gripping film and it’s hardly his fault that some see the climax in a different way.
In India everything is political. Only, we have a problem accepting that truth. And since we don’t have the breadth of vision to accept it, we take off at a tangent in destructive modes, even in debate. A liberal tolerance of a different point of view causes no damage. It means only a greater self restraint”, were the words of M.F. Husain, who incidentally was hounded out of the country. Those who denigrate Gandhi may have a point of view that is not universally popular. The point is whether we can accept it with equanimity.
Some saw the “Father of the Nation” as an appeaser of Muslims and as one of the principal architects of Partition. He is even chastised for refusing to disavow caste although in school I learnt he had invented the term “Harijan” and bid to equalise caste by cleaning bathrooms. However, such symbolism might be dismissed as “tokenism” in the modern era.
Ambedkar had huge issues with him on caste and religion. Some others thought he let down the working class, others had bones to pick about his views on women. Industrialists of his day may have backed him but history suggests he was anti-industry.
About one thing everyone should agree is he was the world’s greatest pacifist. He had lived through many wars, including the Boer War in South Africa, and knew it was evil. Unlike many who lived in the world at the same time as him - people like Lenin Stalin, Hitler and Mao - Gandhi pursued peace. And he did so without ever giving up his Indianness that he rediscovered on his return to India. It would be impossible for a “disruptive” kind of mass leader not to make enemies, including among his own kind.
One never tires of saying that India is a nation that remembers Gandhi but has forgotten his teachings. Leave alone the high moral values, if cleanliness is still a concept in India more than a widespread practice, we know that we have failed Gandhi. I have read that Gandhi wanted us to see freedom as something there to be seized in the present moment, through everyday activities that have nothing to do with the state, things like weaving cloth on the chakra, making our own salt and resolving our own conflicts. Are we even close to resolving our own conflicts is a key question for us now in the 70th year since the great man left us.
