SELF GOURNMENT
Gandhi wanted self-government for India but he believed that all Indians must work for it as one hand. Trying to overcome the urban-rural divide, he transformed the Indian National Congress, which was confined on the upper and middle class to a strong national organization thus joining large sections of the -till then- excluded groups as women, merchants, the peasantry and youth. Gandhi also promoted among his countrymen national self-respect and confidence in their ability to put an end to British rule.
He then perfected the method of satyagraha that he had discovered in South Africa, and developed what he called the “new science of non-violence” involving moral conversion of the adversary by a delicate “surgery of the soul”
"Non-cooperation with evil is as much a duty as cooperation with good." Gandhi
The Untouchables In his trial to consolidate all Indians, Gandhi paid special attention to the 'untouchables'; the lowest rank in the Hindu religion that were terribly humiliated and were not allowed to do but the lowest work. When a family of Untouchables asked to join Gandhi's religious group (the Ashram), Gandhi welcomed them but then the neighbours threatened that they would boycott them and the wealthy Hindus who shared in supporting the group with money stopped their support.
Instead of blenching, wise Gandhi decided to move the whole group to the part of the city where the Untouchables lived and planned that the whole group would earn its living by doing the low work that the Untouchables did. While carrying out his courageous plans, he was called aside by a Moslem merchant who told him he wanted to help the group and asked him if he would accept money from him. The following day after Gandhi approved, the merchant returned back with so much money that Gandhi said "God has sent us help at the last moment."
"Democracy is an impossible thing until the power is shared by all, but let not democracy degenerate into mobocracy." Gandhi was repeatedly imprisoned and resorted to hunger strikes as part of his civil disobedience. When World War II broke out, both the Congress Party and Gandhi decided not to support Britain unless the British grant them complete independence (the "Quit India" movement). He was again imprisoned (that was his final imprisonment) in 1942, but was released two years later, in 1944, because of failing health.
By 1944 the British government had agreed to withdrawal from India on condition that the Congress Party and the Muslim League solve the problems between them. Despite of Gandhi's refusal and resistance to the idea of partition, India and Pakistan became separate states when the British withdrew from India in 1947. (See video for Gandhi with Lord and Lady Mountbatten
of Burma at the Viceroy's Palace New Delhi.)
In 1946 and 1947 severe fights broke out in many parts of India especially where Hindus and Muslims lived side by side. Gandhi lived among them alone and unprotected. In the parts where he lived, peace came sooner because when the two sides started fighting, Gandhi said he wouldn't eat until they stopped fighting. Both Hindus and Moslems respected him so much that they stopped.
When the government of independent India decided, with public support, to break its promise of transferring to Pakistan its share of assets, he opposed the whole country, and successfully awakened its sense of honour and moral obligation through fasting. This wise and courageous act maddened some Hindu nationalists who could not understand him and thought he was harming the Hindus.
The Assassination
On January 30th, 1948, he was walking slowly from his home to attend a prayer meeting when a thirty-nine years old Hindu called Nathuram Godse who mistakably thought Gandhi was harming the Hindus by being friendly to Muslims shot the Great Soul after respectfully bowing to him. (Click on picture for video) A few minutes later a man came out to the waiting crowd and announced that the little old man who sacrificed with all he had for his country, who reshaped the lives of many, who changed the path of the world, who inspired -and still will inspire- mankind till the end of the world was dead.
Through out the long story of Gandhi's life, we tried to deduce Gandhi's characters and suppose how his personality was like. We are mentioning the characters and the reason we called Gandhi so
Mahatma was very honest; even when he was only a child he did not lie to the head of his school and did not give him a more convincing excuse for not attending the school games. He always felt terribly guilty for his mistakes. Even as a young man when he once stole a piece of gold from his brother at the age of fifteen, the deed lay so heavy on his mind that he decided to admit it. He wrote the story of what he had done and gave it to his father. He did not only confess his guilt but asked "adequate" punishment for it. His father read the letter and tears -which Gandhi said 'cleansed his heart and washed his sin away'- trickled down his face. In his autobiography Gandhi wrote about that day,
" This sort of sublime forgiveness was not natural to my father. I had thought that he would be angry, say harsh words and strike his forehead. But he was so wonderfully peaceful, and this was due to my clean confession. A clean confession, combined with a promise never to commit the sin again, when offered before one who has the right to receive it, is the purest type of repentance. I know that my confession made my father feel absolutely safe about me, and increased his affection for me beyond measure."
Such an incident also shows another side of Gandhi's character. He was courageous enough to confess his guilt, as he was courageous enough to refuse to take off his turban when the judge of the court in South Africa ordered him to do so. He was courageous enough to refuse to move from his first class seat. He wanted to know the conditions of poor peasantry. He went to them and the people crowded around him by hundreds. The police ordered him to leave but he refused and when he was taken to court he explained why he disobeyed the police then courageously and very wisely asked the judge to punish him. The court did not know what to do with him so they released him.
In this little body, Gandhi owned incredible strength and patience. When the Untouchables joined his Ashram and the others antagonized them, Gandhi did not yield but did even a more unexpected reaction by moving a whole group to an area where Untouchables lived. Gandhi was patient enough to wait for help until it came with the help of the Moslem merchant. No question he was really patient and sacrificing to bear all the suffering and imprisonments he had gone through.
His sacrificing character is also seen in South Africa when he gave up a financially good position to join with the poor Indians he was working for.
Last but not least, Gandhi's peacefully inclined character is not just obvious from his non-violent policy of non co-operation with the British or refusing to obey unjust laws however calmly accepting any given punishment, but it can be traced sometime before when he was a young lawyer in South Africa. He worked hard to solve the problems between his employer Abdullah Sheth and the opposing merchant outside the court, and after hard work he was finally able to do so in a friendly way.
No doubt the Mahatma (Great Soul) wouldn't have been called so without such fine and even better characters. We can never finish writing about him but this page has to find an end.
Gandhi arrived in India on 15th January (by the beginning of World War 1). He found himself already known as a leader and " a Great Soul". However, he decided to travel all over India to familiarize
imself with his country even more. Gandhi settled near Ahmedabad where he started a religious group-home. Anyone of any race or religion was welcomed there if he was ready to make certain promises which are:
q Always say the truth;
q Never fight or hate others;
q Eat only what was necessary to keep healthy;
q Own only what was necessary.
Then Gandhi plunged into politics and soon became the dominant figure in the Indian National Congress. Gandhi worked for a policy of non-cooperation with the British in 1920-22. He abandoned violence and continued civil disobedience. Organizing protest marches against unjust British actions and demanding boycott of British goods, he was -and for the first time by the British- imprisoned in 1922; but was released two years after.
The famous Dandi March
Probably the most famous of his protest marches is the ' Salt March' in 1930. At that time it was forbidden that the people make salt from sea water, but they had to buy it through the government. As an unfair law, Gandhi saw it must not be obeyed and announced that he will lead his followers to the sea to break the law; and he did. For three weeks the little old man walked bravely with crowds following him from Ahmedabad to the Arabian Sea. In April, 1930 61 years old Gandhi, reached Dandi after walking 241 miles in 24 days There he held out a hand- ful of salt and said God had given the sea; no government and no man can deprive the people of it. As expected -and as he knew- he was imprisoned for some time but was released again in 1931and halted his campaign of civil disobedience after the British made concessions to his demands. In the same year, 1931 Gandhi represented the Indian National Congress at a conference in London.
" Nonviolent action without the cooperation of the heart and the head cannot produce the intended result." Gandhi
Gandhi leaves for England
Gandhi went to a college but didn't remain for a long time. He didn't like the lessons and he didn't do well. So he decided to go to England to study law. That was a difficult decision because it was against his religion to eat and drink with foreigners. Most of the leaders of his group didn't agree on his going. However, Mohandas, in 1888, set out for England leaving a wife and a child behind.
For the first three months in England, Gandhi wasted his time and money but in an amusing way. The young Indian tried to act like an English gentleman. He bought new clothes and a tall hat and every morning he used to spend a lot of time dressing and brushing his hair with care. Young Gandhi also took lessons in dancing, French, playing a musical instrument and such arts, but he didn't do well so he gave up all this and started to study law.
From India to South Africa
In 1891, Gandhi returned to India. He started practicing law in Bombay but after a while he found his work very boring and he felt that this occupation is not suitable for him. However, a change occurred when he was advised to go to South Africa to work as an advisor to an Indian merchant called Abdullah Sheth. In 1893 we find the 24 years old shy lawyer in Durban, South Africa.
The 21 years he spent in South Africa were an extremely important turning point in Gandhi's life. In South Africa, Gandhi found that most of the Indians who had left India and came to Africa were considered of a low rank and were known as "coolies". Since Gandhi was one of them he was treated in the same bad way and was looked at with the same inferior eye. He experienced this feeling when he was riding a train and a man travelling in the same train discovered that Gandhi was sitting in a first-class seat. The man called the railway guard who ordered Gandhi to leave the first-class carriage. Gandhi refused saying that he had bought a first-class ticket and he intended to use it. Then a policeman came and forced Gandhi to leave the whole train. Another example, he was struck by a white man in a large public carriage because the man wanted Gandhi's place and Gandhi refused to leave it. Moreover, that place was outside the carriage, beside the driver and the man who wanted his place was the person in charge.
"We were all coolies. I was an insignificant coolie lawyer. At the time there were no coolie doctors, we had no coolie lawyers, I was the first in the field" Gandhi
These actions, and many others, were just an example of the explicit racial discrimination Indians in South Africa suffered from which propelled Gandhi to hard work to improve the way he and his people were treated. He led campaigns of protest but as a peaceful person he gradually adopted non-violent resistance known as "satyagrapha" (meaning "steadfastness in truth") and he achieved some success in securing racial justice for his people.
"Disobedience to be civil has to be open and nonviolent."
Gandhi
After a year he finished his work with his employer Abdullah Sheth and intended to leave for India but when he knew that a law was to be issued to take even more rights from Indians in South Africa, he
decided to stay in South Africa and work for his people's rights and he did. But after two other years, Gandhi returned to India for several months and came back with his wife and two children. When he was India he tried to tell his people how badly Indians were treated in South Africa, but news of what he had done reached the white people living in Natal and when he tried to land stones and eggs were thrown at him. He was saved by the help of the courageous wife of the English Chief of Police who walked with him until policemen came to his help; and her husband who held the attention of the angry crowd while Gandhi was escaping from the back door.
Gandhi made many sacrifices for his fellow Indians in South Africa but he more and more believed that all problems should not be solved by hatred and violence but by love and in peace. And thus he, and his followers, quietly refused to obey unjust laws. Gandhi was often imprisoned but even then his followers went on with the work. In the end the government could do nothing about it and made many concessions to his demands including recognition of Indian marriages and abolition of the poll tax for them. And so, in1914 and after more than 20 years of hard work, Gandhi left South Africa after the conditions of Indians in South Africa had greatly improved.
Home
Mohandas Gandhi was born on the 2nd October 1869 in Porbandar, in the modern state of Gujarat. His family was a political Hindu family. Both his father and grandfather had been prime ministers to the rulers of two adjacent states and for a long time his father was chief officer in one of the states of India. However, the family came from the traditional caste of grocers and moneylenders. The name "Gandhi" means "grocer" (while the 'Mahatma' means Great Soul, a title given to him later by the great poet Rabindranath Tagore. Mohandas loved his father, who was a fine brave man, very much. He loved his mother too and was much influenced by her. She was a very serious woman in her religion (Jainism), a religion in which ideas of nonviolence and vegetarianism are supreme. Once she felt that her religion demanded that she should not eat until she saw the sun. It was the season of rain and the sun was not usually seen for a long time. Her children were so troubled that they spent hours looking up at the sky so they could hurry and tell their mother that the sun was shining and she could eat.
School
As an introverted child, it was not easy for Gandhi to make friends with other boys in school. He also said-in a book he wrote in his later life-that his only companions were his books and lessons. A small event concerned with school games affected him and in this early age he could learn from it. One day Gandhi was supposed to return to school at four o'clock for school games. He didn't have a watch and the cloudy weather tricked him. He arrived late; the games were over and everyone had left. The following day, he tried to explain to the head of the school why he was late but he was not believed. He was told he was lying. Honest Gandhi, a liar! No! No! But he could not prove he was innocent. So young, he began to understand that a man of truth must be a careful man as well.
"Your character must be above suspicion, and you must be truthful and self-controlled."
Gandhi
Marriage
Gandhi was married when he was only thirteen. However, this age in India at that time was not considered very young but there was another more efficient reason for his early marriage. As marriages cost families a lot, Gandhi's parents decided that the second son (the oldest son of the family was already married) and the third son, young Gandhi together with another relative were to be all married together. Gandhi's wife, Kasturba was also very young. She was only thirteen two.
Expectedly this early marriage hindered his lessons so he lost a year in high school. (His wife was illiterate) But later, Gandhi was able to finish two classes in one year.
"We were both thirteen...the wedding meant no more than wearing new clothes, eating sweets and playing with relatives."
(Gandhi in his autobiography on the day of his wedding)
Youth
As many others, Gandhi made many mistakes during his youth but as a good man he suffered an extreme feeling of guilt afterwards which drove him to make resolution about his moral behavior that were to lead him through out the rest of his life.
For example, according to his religion eating meat was forbidden; but a friend of him convinced him to eat meat and deceive his parents by telling him that the English were stronger than they were and were able to rule over them because they ate meat.
For a year, Gandhi's friend arranged for him to eat meat in secret; but after, Gandhi gave up meat completely because he thought that nothing was worse than deceiving his parents in such way.
Also when Gandhi and a friend of his began to smoke-not because they liked it but they thought that it would please them to get smoke out of their mouths like grown-up men. However, Gandhi soon stopped because he found smoking dirty and harmful.
"Conscience is the ripe fruit of strictest discipline."
Gandhi wanted self-government for India but he believed that all Indians must work for it as one hand. Trying to overcome the urban-rural divide, he transformed the Indian National Congress, which was confined on the upper and middle class to a strong national organization thus joining large sections of the -till then- excluded groups as women, merchants, the peasantry and youth. Gandhi also promoted among his countrymen national self-respect and confidence in their ability to put an end to British rule.He then perfected the method of satyagraha that he had discovered in South Africa, and developed what he called the “new science of non-violence” involving moral conversion of the adversary by a delicate “surgery of the soul”
"Non-cooperation with evil is as much a duty as cooperation with good." Gandhi
The Untouchables In his trial to consolidate all Indians, Gandhi paid special attention to the 'untouchables'; the lowest rank in the Hindu religion that were terribly humiliated and were not allowed to do but the lowest work. When a family of Untouchables asked to join Gandhi's religious group (the Ashram), Gandhi welcomed them but then the neighbours threatened that they would boycott them and the wealthy Hindus who shared in supporting the group with money stopped their support.
Instead of blenching, wise Gandhi decided to move the whole group to the part of the city where the Untouchables lived and planned that the whole group would earn its living by doing the low work that the Untouchables did. While carrying out his courageous plans, he was called aside by a Moslem merchant who told him he wanted to help the group and asked him if he would accept money from him. The following day after Gandhi approved, the merchant returned back with so much money that Gandhi said "God has sent us help at the last moment."
"Democracy is an impossible thing until the power is shared by all, but let not democracy degenerate into mobocracy." Gandhi was repeatedly imprisoned and resorted to hunger strikes as part of his civil disobedience. When World War II broke out, both the Congress Party and Gandhi decided not to support Britain unless the British grant them complete independence (the "Quit India" movement). He was again imprisoned (that was his final imprisonment) in 1942, but was released two years later, in 1944, because of failing health.
By 1944 the British government had agreed to withdrawal from India on condition that the Congress Party and the Muslim League solve the problems between them. Despite of Gandhi's refusal and resistance to the idea of partition, India and Pakistan became separate states when the British withdrew from India in 1947. (See video for Gandhi with Lord and Lady Mountbatten
of Burma at the Viceroy's Palace New Delhi.)
In 1946 and 1947 severe fights broke out in many parts of India especially where Hindus and Muslims lived side by side. Gandhi lived among them alone and unprotected. In the parts where he lived, peace came sooner because when the two sides started fighting, Gandhi said he wouldn't eat until they stopped fighting. Both Hindus and Moslems respected him so much that they stopped.
When the government of independent India decided, with public support, to break its promise of transferring to Pakistan its share of assets, he opposed the whole country, and successfully awakened its sense of honour and moral obligation through fasting. This wise and courageous act maddened some Hindu nationalists who could not understand him and thought he was harming the Hindus.
The Assassination
On January 30th, 1948, he was walking slowly from his home to attend a prayer meeting when a thirty-nine years old Hindu called Nathuram Godse who mistakably thought Gandhi was harming the Hindus by being friendly to Muslims shot the Great Soul after respectfully bowing to him. (Click on picture for video) A few minutes later a man came out to the waiting crowd and announced that the little old man who sacrificed with all he had for his country, who reshaped the lives of many, who changed the path of the world, who inspired -and still will inspire- mankind till the end of the world was dead.
Through out the long story of Gandhi's life, we tried to deduce Gandhi's characters and suppose how his personality was like. We are mentioning the characters and the reason we called Gandhi so
Mahatma was very honest; even when he was only a child he did not lie to the head of his school and did not give him a more convincing excuse for not attending the school games. He always felt terribly guilty for his mistakes. Even as a young man when he once stole a piece of gold from his brother at the age of fifteen, the deed lay so heavy on his mind that he decided to admit it. He wrote the story of what he had done and gave it to his father. He did not only confess his guilt but asked "adequate" punishment for it. His father read the letter and tears -which Gandhi said 'cleansed his heart and washed his sin away'- trickled down his face. In his autobiography Gandhi wrote about that day,
" This sort of sublime forgiveness was not natural to my father. I had thought that he would be angry, say harsh words and strike his forehead. But he was so wonderfully peaceful, and this was due to my clean confession. A clean confession, combined with a promise never to commit the sin again, when offered before one who has the right to receive it, is the purest type of repentance. I know that my confession made my father feel absolutely safe about me, and increased his affection for me beyond measure."
Such an incident also shows another side of Gandhi's character. He was courageous enough to confess his guilt, as he was courageous enough to refuse to take off his turban when the judge of the court in South Africa ordered him to do so. He was courageous enough to refuse to move from his first class seat. He wanted to know the conditions of poor peasantry. He went to them and the people crowded around him by hundreds. The police ordered him to leave but he refused and when he was taken to court he explained why he disobeyed the police then courageously and very wisely asked the judge to punish him. The court did not know what to do with him so they released him.
In this little body, Gandhi owned incredible strength and patience. When the Untouchables joined his Ashram and the others antagonized them, Gandhi did not yield but did even a more unexpected reaction by moving a whole group to an area where Untouchables lived. Gandhi was patient enough to wait for help until it came with the help of the Moslem merchant. No question he was really patient and sacrificing to bear all the suffering and imprisonments he had gone through.
His sacrificing character is also seen in South Africa when he gave up a financially good position to join with the poor Indians he was working for.
Last but not least, Gandhi's peacefully inclined character is not just obvious from his non-violent policy of non co-operation with the British or refusing to obey unjust laws however calmly accepting any given punishment, but it can be traced sometime before when he was a young lawyer in South Africa. He worked hard to solve the problems between his employer Abdullah Sheth and the opposing merchant outside the court, and after hard work he was finally able to do so in a friendly way.
No doubt the Mahatma (Great Soul) wouldn't have been called so without such fine and even better characters. We can never finish writing about him but this page has to find an end.
Gandhi arrived in India on 15th January (by the beginning of World War 1). He found himself already known as a leader and " a Great Soul". However, he decided to travel all over India to familiarize
imself with his country even more. Gandhi settled near Ahmedabad where he started a religious group-home. Anyone of any race or religion was welcomed there if he was ready to make certain promises which are:
q Always say the truth;
q Never fight or hate others;
q Eat only what was necessary to keep healthy;
q Own only what was necessary.
Then Gandhi plunged into politics and soon became the dominant figure in the Indian National Congress. Gandhi worked for a policy of non-cooperation with the British in 1920-22. He abandoned violence and continued civil disobedience. Organizing protest marches against unjust British actions and demanding boycott of British goods, he was -and for the first time by the British- imprisoned in 1922; but was released two years after.
The famous Dandi March
Probably the most famous of his protest marches is the ' Salt March' in 1930. At that time it was forbidden that the people make salt from sea water, but they had to buy it through the government. As an unfair law, Gandhi saw it must not be obeyed and announced that he will lead his followers to the sea to break the law; and he did. For three weeks the little old man walked bravely with crowds following him from Ahmedabad to the Arabian Sea. In April, 1930 61 years old Gandhi, reached Dandi after walking 241 miles in 24 days There he held out a hand- ful of salt and said God had given the sea; no government and no man can deprive the people of it. As expected -and as he knew- he was imprisoned for some time but was released again in 1931and halted his campaign of civil disobedience after the British made concessions to his demands. In the same year, 1931 Gandhi represented the Indian National Congress at a conference in London.
" Nonviolent action without the cooperation of the heart and the head cannot produce the intended result." Gandhi
Gandhi leaves for England
Gandhi went to a college but didn't remain for a long time. He didn't like the lessons and he didn't do well. So he decided to go to England to study law. That was a difficult decision because it was against his religion to eat and drink with foreigners. Most of the leaders of his group didn't agree on his going. However, Mohandas, in 1888, set out for England leaving a wife and a child behind.
For the first three months in England, Gandhi wasted his time and money but in an amusing way. The young Indian tried to act like an English gentleman. He bought new clothes and a tall hat and every morning he used to spend a lot of time dressing and brushing his hair with care. Young Gandhi also took lessons in dancing, French, playing a musical instrument and such arts, but he didn't do well so he gave up all this and started to study law.
From India to South Africa
In 1891, Gandhi returned to India. He started practicing law in Bombay but after a while he found his work very boring and he felt that this occupation is not suitable for him. However, a change occurred when he was advised to go to South Africa to work as an advisor to an Indian merchant called Abdullah Sheth. In 1893 we find the 24 years old shy lawyer in Durban, South Africa.
The 21 years he spent in South Africa were an extremely important turning point in Gandhi's life. In South Africa, Gandhi found that most of the Indians who had left India and came to Africa were considered of a low rank and were known as "coolies". Since Gandhi was one of them he was treated in the same bad way and was looked at with the same inferior eye. He experienced this feeling when he was riding a train and a man travelling in the same train discovered that Gandhi was sitting in a first-class seat. The man called the railway guard who ordered Gandhi to leave the first-class carriage. Gandhi refused saying that he had bought a first-class ticket and he intended to use it. Then a policeman came and forced Gandhi to leave the whole train. Another example, he was struck by a white man in a large public carriage because the man wanted Gandhi's place and Gandhi refused to leave it. Moreover, that place was outside the carriage, beside the driver and the man who wanted his place was the person in charge.
"We were all coolies. I was an insignificant coolie lawyer. At the time there were no coolie doctors, we had no coolie lawyers, I was the first in the field" Gandhi
These actions, and many others, were just an example of the explicit racial discrimination Indians in South Africa suffered from which propelled Gandhi to hard work to improve the way he and his people were treated. He led campaigns of protest but as a peaceful person he gradually adopted non-violent resistance known as "satyagrapha" (meaning "steadfastness in truth") and he achieved some success in securing racial justice for his people.
"Disobedience to be civil has to be open and nonviolent."
Gandhi
After a year he finished his work with his employer Abdullah Sheth and intended to leave for India but when he knew that a law was to be issued to take even more rights from Indians in South Africa, he
decided to stay in South Africa and work for his people's rights and he did. But after two other years, Gandhi returned to India for several months and came back with his wife and two children. When he was India he tried to tell his people how badly Indians were treated in South Africa, but news of what he had done reached the white people living in Natal and when he tried to land stones and eggs were thrown at him. He was saved by the help of the courageous wife of the English Chief of Police who walked with him until policemen came to his help; and her husband who held the attention of the angry crowd while Gandhi was escaping from the back door.
Gandhi made many sacrifices for his fellow Indians in South Africa but he more and more believed that all problems should not be solved by hatred and violence but by love and in peace. And thus he, and his followers, quietly refused to obey unjust laws. Gandhi was often imprisoned but even then his followers went on with the work. In the end the government could do nothing about it and made many concessions to his demands including recognition of Indian marriages and abolition of the poll tax for them. And so, in1914 and after more than 20 years of hard work, Gandhi left South Africa after the conditions of Indians in South Africa had greatly improved.
Home
Mohandas Gandhi was born on the 2nd October 1869 in Porbandar, in the modern state of Gujarat. His family was a political Hindu family. Both his father and grandfather had been prime ministers to the rulers of two adjacent states and for a long time his father was chief officer in one of the states of India. However, the family came from the traditional caste of grocers and moneylenders. The name "Gandhi" means "grocer" (while the 'Mahatma' means Great Soul, a title given to him later by the great poet Rabindranath Tagore. Mohandas loved his father, who was a fine brave man, very much. He loved his mother too and was much influenced by her. She was a very serious woman in her religion (Jainism), a religion in which ideas of nonviolence and vegetarianism are supreme. Once she felt that her religion demanded that she should not eat until she saw the sun. It was the season of rain and the sun was not usually seen for a long time. Her children were so troubled that they spent hours looking up at the sky so they could hurry and tell their mother that the sun was shining and she could eat. School
As an introverted child, it was not easy for Gandhi to make friends with other boys in school. He also said-in a book he wrote in his later life-that his only companions were his books and lessons. A small event concerned with school games affected him and in this early age he could learn from it. One day Gandhi was supposed to return to school at four o'clock for school games. He didn't have a watch and the cloudy weather tricked him. He arrived late; the games were over and everyone had left. The following day, he tried to explain to the head of the school why he was late but he was not believed. He was told he was lying. Honest Gandhi, a liar! No! No! But he could not prove he was innocent. So young, he began to understand that a man of truth must be a careful man as well.
"Your character must be above suspicion, and you must be truthful and self-controlled."
Gandhi
Marriage
Gandhi was married when he was only thirteen. However, this age in India at that time was not considered very young but there was another more efficient reason for his early marriage. As marriages cost families a lot, Gandhi's parents decided that the second son (the oldest son of the family was already married) and the third son, young Gandhi together with another relative were to be all married together. Gandhi's wife, Kasturba was also very young. She was only thirteen two.
Expectedly this early marriage hindered his lessons so he lost a year in high school. (His wife was illiterate) But later, Gandhi was able to finish two classes in one year.
"We were both thirteen...the wedding meant no more than wearing new clothes, eating sweets and playing with relatives."
(Gandhi in his autobiography on the day of his wedding)
Youth
As many others, Gandhi made many mistakes during his youth but as a good man he suffered an extreme feeling of guilt afterwards which drove him to make resolution about his moral behavior that were to lead him through out the rest of his life.
For example, according to his religion eating meat was forbidden; but a friend of him convinced him to eat meat and deceive his parents by telling him that the English were stronger than they were and were able to rule over them because they ate meat.
For a year, Gandhi's friend arranged for him to eat meat in secret; but after, Gandhi gave up meat completely because he thought that nothing was worse than deceiving his parents in such way.Also when Gandhi and a friend of his began to smoke-not because they liked it but they thought that it would please them to get smoke out of their mouths like grown-up men. However, Gandhi soon stopped because he found smoking dirty and harmful.
"Conscience is the ripe fruit of strictest discipline."
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