Remembering Gandhi
When the whole country is celebrating Mahatma Gandhi’s birthday, the question I ask today is, have we really earned the right to celebrate anything to do with this man when we have violated every single tenet that he had held dear? Is it not hypocritical to shower flowers on his stone statues, have lecture series on him, declare 2nd of October as a public holiday when everything that we do actually goes against what he prescribed, and believed in and practiced himself?
Is the brutal gang rape and death of a 19-year-old Dalit girl in Hathras, Uttar Pradesh, just a small item in the news or is it a reflection of what Indian society has become today? This single event has violated several elements of Gandhi’s philosophy of life. Would this crime be less heinous if this girl was not a Dalit? Most certainly not. But that it happened to a Dalit girl by upper-caste Hindu boys and the subsequent treatment meted out to the family is even more grievous because the victim was a Dalit. We feel we give dignity to the victim by not mentioning her name and yet do not allow her parents to be present in her cremation. Would that have happened if the girl was from a different segment of society? The discrimination that happens because of caste, gender, and economics has become a regular feature of our social fabric.
And it was Gandhi who had said, “the practice of untouchability is a leper wound in the whole-body of Hindu politic”. He made it his life’s mission to wipe out untouchability and to uplift the depressed and the downtrodden people, and to see that nothing much has changed even after 72 years of his death is indeed very sad.
A man against violence of any kind, Gandhi would have cringed at the thought of such carnal sexual violence. His exploration with celibacy and abstinence from any “lustful intention” seems so inappropriate in today’s discussion. In the midst of several murmurings, he managed to effectively redefine the concept of chastity to fit his personal practices.
Gandhi’s idea of the status of women also stood out during his times and is still relevant during our times. He had said, “A more potent cause of illiteracy amongst women is the status of inferiority with which an immemorial tradition has unjustly branded her. Man has converted her into a domestic drudge and an instrument of his pleasure, instead of regarding her as his helpmate and ‘better half’! The result is a semi-paralysis of our society. A woman has rightly been called the mother of the race. We owe it to her and to ourselves to undo the great wrong that we have done her.” And that seems such a contrast to the present CM of Uttar Pradesh statement “ Women are not capable of being left free or independent”.
So where do we go from here? Educators like me will perennially create an environment in schools where Gandhi’s ideals are continuously discussed and debated upon so that it can be converted from words into action. In Parikrma we believe it is as important to sensitise the boys as it is to strengthen the girls. Things will only change when the young put their foot down and say enough is enough, and there is an alternate way of doing things.
Gandhi’s words “I have always held that it is physically impossible to violate a woman against her will. The outrage takes place only when she gives way to fear or does not realize her moral strength”. I know that does not entirely hold true in cases of dastardly violence against minor girls. But if we get our girls to be strong and empower them with both mental and physical skills and at the same time sensitise our boys to respect women, then we will see some change.
Gandhi’s dream of India was a beautiful idea but it is up to us to make it a reality. Every October let us assess how far we have wavered from that dream and recalibrate ourselves to make India a better place.
