Mahatma as media phenomenon

Book review - Gandhian Thought and Communication: Rethinking the Mahatma in the Media Age

Mahatma Gandhi’s ascent to global prominence was partly a result of his communication skills. This attribute can be illustrated by the following example. In the Time  magazine cover dated March 31, 1930, Gandhi was caricatured as a fiend. On its January 5, 1930 cover, however,  Time  portrayed him as an angel and designated him “Man of the Year”. Within 10 months, then, Gandhi appeared twice in two different avatars, a transformation that reflects his skill in influencing global public opinion. It is a skill he wields posthumously, too.

This book examines the Mahatma as a master communicator in 10 chapters. Its editor Biswajit Das notes how Gandhi’s spectre haunts contemporary media, both on- and offline. For this reason, he convened academics specialising in communication studies, critical theorists, historians, philosophers, and sociologists for a seminar and selected some of the most interesting studies to produce a book worth perusing by anyone who is interested in modern media. 

The first two chapters offer novel interpretations of Gandhi’s Hind Swaraj  (1909), which has been read conventionally as an anti-modern text. But Prafulla Kar argues that Gandhi was merely opposed to a particular kind of western modernity and wanted to provide an alternative blueprint for India. In doing so, a distinctive idea of the nation emerged, based on ethics and a sense of duty rather than on identity assertion. Alok Bajpai, too, reads Hind Swaraj  against the current. For him, it reflects Gandhi’s argumentative side and reveals a modern liberatory consciousness. The goal of Hind Swaraj, according to Mr Bajpai, was to demonstrate the possibility of creating a society free from exploitation and to emphasise that this possibility lay within the grasp of the common, unarmed individual.

Ratnakar Tripathy’s “Reflections on Gandhi’s Autobiography” wonders why a citizen cannot walk up to a prime minister and convey her concerns. He believes that our democratic institutions have created firewalls between the ruler and the ruled. One solution to this problem is Gandhi’s communication style reflected in his autobiography, in which the Mahatma talks about his confusions and traumas. The central message of Gandhi’s autobiography, according to Mr Tripathy, is “let’s talk”.

The second part of  Rethinking the Mahatma  has three inter-related studies on the various communication styles Gandhi employed. Shashi Upadhayay takes us back to a foundational Gandhian satyagraha  —  the Ahmedabad Mill Strike of 1918 that coincided with the Bolshevik Revolution. He dwells on novel forms of communication Gandhi developed during this strike: Personal communication; arbitration; satyagraha;  fasting; multi-religious prayer meetings; foot marches and the charkha.

The charkha  is interpreted by Sadan Jha in “Multi-verse of Gandhi’s  charkha ”. One interpretation is particularly attractive. From 1942, the Mahatma became increasingly anachronistic, and his ideas and practices were gradually erased, especially the use of the  charkha . It was substituted on the national flag by the Ashoka  chakra, The substitution of the wheel of labour and dignity by the dharmic wheel was justified by Radhakrishnan and Nehru, hinting at Gandhi’s irrelevance in the new scheme for building a modern India.

Keval Kumar’s chapter on Gandhi as a “Journalist, Communicator and Satyagrahi ” highlights how Gandhi transformed the Congress Party from a debating club into a messaging organisation. He weaponised his journals to reach out to the masses. The millions of words that he churned out as a writer were comparable to the many miles Gandhi traversed on foot, as he broke elitist barricades and walked into people’s hearts. His mastery of English and Hindustani permitted him to communicate directly with millions. Prayer sessions and bhajans  were more effective than rousing speeches. And with his constructive work in sanitation, healthcare and education, Gandhi built a world for the poor for whom mere words were insufficient.

The third section has two studies on Gandhi and Hindi cinema. Arunabha Ghosh and Partha Ray note Bollywood’s audacious deconstruction of Gandhi’s sanctimonious image with Lage Raho, Munnabhai  (2006), repackaging greatness for popular consumption. From this cult movie, Dev Pathak zooms on to a dozen films demonstrating how Gandhi acquired a fluid character — a moral figure, a historical culprit, as a photo on the wall, and even as a part of a joke.

The locus of the last two chapters is the digital world. Gopalan Ravindran maps the rhizomatic constructions of the Mahatma on the Web 2.0 by alluding to how Gandhi’s words and ideals have been connected, contested, and ruptured far beyond the binary of liking or hating the Mahatma. Mohammed Hanif examines from a Gandhian perspective the economic model of Auroville — a multicultural township  in Tamil Nadu.

For anyone who wants to understand how a mild-mannered young adult who struggled to speak in public could command the attention of viceroys, the common man and children, or how the posthumous Gandhi continues to influence people at home and around the world, this book is an invitation to engage with the Mahatma as a media phenomenon.

The reviewer is Assistant Professor, BITS Pilani