I was grown up listening to the stories of what Mahatma did to this sub-continent. At the same time I used to listen many denigrate mouths around me. Sometimes even I used to believe such. But before three years when I read his book " The Story of My Experiments with Truth" about his biography which was written by himself changed the way I think about him. Though it is his own personal book, it was genuine both in in terms of his personal and professional life.
"You must not lose faith in humanity. Humanity is an ocean; if a few drops of the ocean are dirty, the ocean does not become dirty. " - MAHATMA GANDHI
Being an Indian everyone knows what our Father of Nation did to India and his struggle for the independence. So it's bizarre to discuss about his life but I would like to tell you an incredible story about him during the day of Independence.
Many times in our lives we saw the day of our Independence (Aug 15th 1947) in t.v's or Youtube where Nehru, Patel and other leaders were gathered to celebrate one and the most important day in the history of India, but no one questioned why Gandhi wasn't present there. No one even around me whom I used to talk about Independence never questioned about his presence ? Not even in the meetings held on Aug 15th at schools or colleges ?
Where was he ?
When the whole India is celebrating the Independence, Gandhi travelled Calcutta which has plans to move to Naokhali (now in Bangaldesh) a district which was turn into pieces due to violence and communal massacre. In Calcutta, leading figures urged Gandhi not to continue to East Bengal. They felt if Gandhi could bring peace to Calcutta, peace would be restored in all of Bengal.
Gandhi then decided to stay at Hyderi Manzil, close to a Muslim dominated slum called Miabagan. There, he received hundreds of visitors and held prayer meetings. There were constant protests of "Gandhi go back" outside, as some felt Gandhi unduly sympathised with Muslims.
Gandhi began efforts to personally pacify people from either community and urge them to end the violence. On many occasions, angry mobs refused to bow down, but Gandhi continued his efforts. Within days, the result was visible for everyone to see. Lord Mountbatten, noting this, wrote "In the Punjab we have 55 thousand soldiers and large-scale rioting on our hands. In Bengal our forces consist of one man, and there is no rioting."
On 15 August Gandhi marked the day with a 24 hour fast, prayer, and spinning yarn. "My way of celebrating great events, such as today's, is to thank God for it and, therefore, to pray," he wrote to his Quaker friend Agatha Harrison. When C Rajagopalachari visited and congratulated Gandhi for restoring peace in the city, Gandhi said he will not be satisfied "until Hindus and Muslims felt safe in one another's company and returned to their own homes to life as before."
Gandhi had further planned to travel to Delhi, then move on to Punjab, and eventually to Lahore, and thus bit by bit bring peace to entire country. Sadly, what eventually ended the violence was the shock and horror of Bapu's murder. (Source : Sanjeev Sharma).
But today we spread stories like - he was the responsible for Bose and Bhagat Singh's disappearance and death respectively. They are great leaders but no one united India as Gandhi did. Today we Indians living together with out kingdom provinces which has separate rules back then are living today together because of the Unity which was created by "Jaathi Pitha".
When we Indians doesn't even care about our leaders, but the English made a film on him which was awarded with many awards. It's time for everyone to understand what he did to our nation.
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