Why India Is the Land of Many Gandhis

Today, October 2, is Gandhi Jayanti, the birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi.

From Surankote in Jammu and Kashmir to the hilly borders between Nagaland and Myanmar and from Madurai in Tamil Nadu to Patkura in Odisha, many pockets in India have produced leaders whose lives prompted people to bestow on them the name “Gandhi” as a political epithet.

N.M.R. Subbaraman, popularly known as “Madurai Gandhi”, was a freedom fighter who followed the Gandhian style of politics. He conducted a Salt March, participated in picketing, and courted arrest. He joined the Bhoodan Movement and donated a substantial amount of land. He also set up several hostels for people labelled as untouchables in Tamil Nadu.

Natwar Thakkar, affectionately remembered as “Gandhi of Nagaland”, made the Naga Hills District his home sometime around 1955 when the area was under the grip of violent insurgency. After the area was placed under the direct command of the Indian Army, Thakkar played a key role in facilitating dialogues during the army’s standoff with the local population.

Known as “Patkura Gandhi”, Raj Kishore Nayak of Odisha used to serve the victims of natural calamities, especially floods, in undivided Cuttack district during the first half of the 20th century. Later, he became a teacher, firmly convinced this was the profession that could lay the foundation for a more humane society.

These figures were three among many across India who have been honoured as the Gandhis of their localities.

One wonders why the name of any other leader didn’t transform into a popular political epithet in this way. After all, the freedom movement in India was led by many brilliant and charismatic people. One has hardly ever heard, if not at all, about a Jawaharlal of Nagaland, an Ambedkar of Odisha, Vallabhai of Tamil Nadu, or Radhakrishnan of Kashmir.

Besides his role as one of the frontline leaders of the freedom movement, Jawaharlal Nehru used to deliver unforgettable speeches such as ‘Tryst with Destiny’ and authored several classics like The Discovery of India. Vallabhai Patel was an outstanding organiser who exercised a firm grip on the enormous Congress organisation at a time when a letter took weeks to reach the many parts of the country that were bereft of roads and railways.

With two doctorates, from Columbia University and the London School of Economics, Dr B.R. Ambedkar was an acclaimed authority on ancient Indian commerce, the Indian rupee, Marxism, and Buddhism. Sarvapalli Radhakrishnan was a thinker who helped reshape Western opinion about Indian philosophy, from something mystic and exotic to a serious discipline of study.

Most of the prominent political leaders in early 20th century India possessed extraordinary intellect and unique personalities that left a lasting impact on their chosen fields. However, the other characteristic common to them was that they happened to be inimitable. The word inimitable means “too good or individual for anyone else to copy with the same effect”.

In contrast, Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi seemed disappointingly ordinary. He could neither be described to have an imposing appearance nor did he possess a commanding voice. He was not a brilliant student, great writer, elegant orator, rabble rousing crowd mobiliser, or a man of versatile talents.

While Subhas Chandra Bose escaped the country in disguise and boarded cars, steamers, submarines, and planes to take India’s cause to world capitals, Gandhi chose the most unexciting forms of mobility. He simply walked through villages and towns across the subcontinent and travelled in stinking, overcrowded trains.

However, Gandhi succeeded in nurturing a political culture outside the realm of adventure and meritocracy. He firmly anchored politics in the mundane and everyday concerns of people that required practical solutions and small sacrifices.

He was perhaps the rare political leader of national and international stature who obsessed over cheap and nutritious food for Indians, clean toilet habits, and keeping meticulous accounts of household expenses.

For instance, Gandhi was interested in promoting soybeans, papayas, and sugarcane as regular components of the Indian diet. He insisted on eating raw vegetables to get one’s vitamins and was obsessed with flatulence after a meal. Zac O’Yeah, author of a well regarded book on Gandhi, had unearthed an interesting detail about his life. A Guide to Health, a manual on healthy cooking authored by Gandhi, was his highest selling book in his lifetime.

People could instinctively appreciate Gandhi’s politics. It possessed an adhesive quality and never lost its intimate contact with challenges faced by individuals, households, and local communities while tackling grand questions about politics and society.

Also read: What Would Gandhi Do Today?

Two examples illustrate the accessibility of Gandhi’s politics.

First, ordinary people sprang up to participate in it without drastically altering the course of their lives. Simple habits, such as waking up early in the morning, cleaning one’s house and village, and spinning cotton were rendered meaningful and elevated to the political orbit.

Second, one could practice Gandhi’s politics without even being a follower or a disciple. Chowdhary Ghulam Hussain Lassanvi, hailed as Gujjar Gandhi in Jammu and Kashmir, was not a Gandhian. But he was regarded as one for his tireless efforts to reduce the grazing tax imposed on tribal, livestock-rearing communities like the Gujjars and Bakarwals. He also established a food bank for the poor in these communities.

However, one must also acknowledge that the immense popularity of Gandhian politics also had undesirable consequences. Not only did it flatten the masses’ understanding of the complexity in modern Indian politics and history, but this popularity also ensured that the thoughts and methods that governed Gandhi’s politics remained handcuffed to him.

The faintest echo of Gandhian thoughts made independent political thinkers in the twentieth century seem like Gandhi’s disciples. For instance, according to some historians and biographers, Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan’s belief in non-violence was not directly inspired by Gandhi. It was a position Khan had arrived at on his own intellectual steam, identifying a distinct non-violent strand in the life of Prophet Muhammad. Khan had argued that non-violence was the “twin of patience”, which is emphasised frequently in the Quran.

Bestowing the epithet “Frontier Gandhi” on Khan did not just blot out the man’s complex and distinct political identity. Khan’s political project of anchoring Islam in non-violence, which held immense significance for the Indian sub-continent, was extinguished before it had a real chance.

Sampad Patnaik is a freelance journalist. Jatindra Nayak is a translator and literary critic.