Understanding the 'marginal' Mahatma

BOOK EXTRACT

While there is no dearth of literature available on Mahatma Gandhi, including biographies on him, Bidyut Chakrabarty's endeavour seeks to conceptualise the evolution of Bapu's ideas in the context of the anti-colonial nationalism.

But it isn't an all-out glorified tribute either; the book also questions if Gandhi, towards the end, kowtowed to the wishes of the younger leaders. And if yes, why? This book attempts to put a more contemporary spin on the country's most iconic figure.

The last two years of Gandhi's life were most significant for India's freedom struggle. The 1946 communal riots in Calcutta and Noakhali convinced the leading Congress stalwarts, including Nehru and Patel, of the need for partition despite the fact that none of them endorsed the two-nation theory.

What is also striking is the conspicuous absence of Gandhi in the final negotiation for the transfer of power. Gandhi had no alternative, it seems, but to accept the decision of the younger leaders. Was Gandhi strategic in his response or was persuaded by the arguments, made in favour of partition, one wonders.

The doubt persists because the Mahatma was never at ease with the idea of Pakistan, Jinnah's separate Muslim state. In his prayer meeting in June 1947, he thus argued, 'Pakistan is a bad thing... What is there to rejoice over it? Our country has been divided... does it mean we should divide our hearts? How can the people of a country become two people? India can have only one people.'

Gandhi might have thought that partition was a temporary arrangement for the transfer of power, and would lose its significance once Hindus and Muslims realised themselves the importance of the communal amity.

This argument can easily be justified by Gandhi's assertion that a satyagrahi is always an optimist and pessimism has no place in him. His optimism is based on his belief that people and situations can radically change. His non-violent emancipatory struggle is based on the belief that one's oppressors are temporary 'foes', but potential friends.

So, Gandhi's definitions of 'friends and foes' are primarily 'contextual'. There is, therefore, a mixture of both in every one of us. Gandhi demonstrated that by activating the forces of good in their opponents, 'the non-violent resisters can reduce or eliminate basic conflicts without causing any damage to the Truth or ontic relationship between the oppressed and the oppressor.

This is probably the 'cycle of life' in which Gandhi had full trust. He witnessed the changes in 1947, and freedom came marking the withdrawal of the British from India. Freedom was won, but was accompanied by the trauma of partition and the mayhem that followed immediately before the transfer of power was formally articulated.

The Gandhi-led nationalist movement led to freedom, but failed to avoid partition. Despite Gandhi's vehement opposition to the division of the country on the basis of religion, the Congress leadership accepted partition as the best probable solution to the communal animosity.

The day for which Gandhi 'had longed and laboured had come, but he felt no joy because India's freedom was ushered in at the cost of her unity'. Gandhi alone was troubled by feelings of disillusionment, despair and deep foreboding while the British government was relieved at the prospect of an orderly transfer of power.

He felt totally marginalised in the entire negotiations for the transfer of power. No longer critical to the nationalist articulation of freedom, he confessed, "I find myself alone. Even the Sardar and Jawaharlal think my reading of the situation is wrong and peace is sure to return if partition is agreed upon ... They wonder if I have not deteriorated with age. I can see clearly that the future of independence gained at this price is going to be dark."

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Mahatma Gandhi: A Historical Biography
Author Bidyut Chakrabarty
PUBLISHER Roli Books
PAGES 336
PRICE Rs 350