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Satyagraha As the Gandhian Solution to Resolve Conflict Mrs Joshi - Bedekar College, Thane / website : www.vpmthane.org 55 Satyagraha as the Gandhian solution to Resolve Conflict Mrs. Namita Nimbalkar Lecturer, Department of Philosophy Director, Gandhian Studies Centre, Birla College, Kalyan Abstract: Gandhi’s struggle called Satyagraha was a moral equivalent of war and a deeply spiritual action. Satyagraha was an important constituent of Gandhi’s programme of national self-purification. Gandhi distinguished between passive resistance and satyagraha. The basic postulate of satyagraha rests on the belief in the inherent goodness of man, moral power and the capacity to suffer for the opponent. Satyagraha was and can be used as a method to resolve conflict and to manage oneself in the face of opposition. In Gandhi’s hand Satyagraha got its metaphysics, its philosophy, its technique and its dynamic as well as its positive function in individual and social life. We can achieve everything by love. Love can never be impatient and nor can it ever be angry - M. K. Gandhi India is observing 150 years of the first war of did not take any major decision for themselves. It was independence, 100 years of Satyagraha, 60 years of like a fresh wind, which had blown into their lives, daring Independence and will also witness 60 years of the them to come out in the open and breath fresh air. martyrdom of mahatma Gandhi. The world and India The same holds true when Gandhi used the has come a long way in the past one hundred fifty years. weapon of Satyagraha in India. The millions in India Gandhi expounded the philosophy of Satyagraha were coiled in superstition, poverty, ignorance, and hundred years back. The need of the hour is to religious beliefs and had no weapon with which to resist understand his philosophy of Satyagraha so that we the mighty empire. Gandhi provided them the weapon can resolve conflict and manage ourselves in better of non-violence, urged them to resist with non- manner. cooperation and shook the foundation of the empire Non-violence is both a science and an art. Like on which the sun was never to set. Gandhi struck a all sciences, it has a history and philosophy behind it. It chord with people, talked about their concerns in the is not an invention of the age. It is a discovery that has language they understood. He also believed that in our been resuscitated from the debris of violence and land of millions of destitute and crippled people, if we materialism of rage and passion, of hatred and take to the practice of seeking justice through murder, competition by which it has been covered over for there would be a terrifying situation. Our poor people centuries. Gandhi’s struggle called Satyagraha was a will become victims of our atrocities. By making a moral equivalent of war and a deeply spiritual action. dharma of violence, we shall be reaping the fruit of our To quote Gandhi, ‘I believe in war bereft of every trace own actions. The only weapon available to the people of violence.’ was a spiritual weapon and that was Satyagraha. Satyagraha was an important constituent of The term Satyagraha was coined by Mohandas Gandhi’s programme of national self-purification. When Karamchand Gandhi in South Africa as a name for the he started campaigning against the racially force that Indians there used in their fight to earn respect discriminatory measures in South Africa Gandhi and basic rights. The root meaning of Satyagraha is discovered that his countrymen there lacked personal holding on to ‘truth’ hence truth force. It is a combination and communal self-respect, courage and the willingness of two words – Satya and Agraha. The word Satya to organize themselves. In a memorable phrase, he is derived from Sanskrit ‘Sat’ which means ‘being’ or urged them to ‘rebel’ against themselves. The concept to exist ‘eternally’. Nothing really exists eternally except of ‘rebel’ was something totally new for the people, Truth. Truth is also absolute which means God. who up till now were used to take orders and not do Therefore, Truth is God. Agraha means holding firmly any critical thinking on their own. In fact the people on to truth. National Seminar on Indian Philosophy: It’s Relevance in the 21st Century - 18th & 19th January, 2008 56 Joshi - Bedekar College, Thane / website : www.vpmthane.org Gandhi believed in the efficacy of Satyagraha. For Gandhi, “For me, the law of satyagraha, the law of Gandhi Satyagraha, meaning civil insistence on or love, is an eternal principle. I co-operate with all that is tenacity in the pursuit of truth, aimed to penetrate the good. I desire to non-cooperate with all that is evil, barriers of prejudice, ill will, dogmatism, self- whether it is associated with my wife, son or myself.” righteousness and selfishness to reach out to and The love force in Satyagraha has no room for hatred activate the soul of opponent. The concept of against ‘others’. Satyagraha is subject to a higher law. Satyagraha gives practical expression to religious and Gandhi had made it very clear, ‘Hatred has no place in ethical ideals of truth and non-violence. But Gandhi’s Satyagraha but is a positive breach of its ruling principle. choice of the term Satyagraha did more than that: it Satyagraha proceeds on the active principle of love, forged bond between his actions and his basic beliefs which says, love those that despitefully use you. It is concerning the nature of man and the nature of reality. easy for you to love your friends. But I say unto you, His religious and metaphysical beliefs concerning truth love your enemies.’ The compassion and influence of or god, the soul or atman and essential unity of all Christianity is evident in the above statement of Gandhi. existence were given existential expression through the The reading and understanding of different principle of Satyagraha. Hence, the reason it is referred religions and traditions can be observed in Gandhi’s to as truth force or soul force or surgery of the soul. formulation of Satyagraha. Gandhi fused his own Satyagraha is Gandhi’s technique of nonviolent interpretation of Indian tradition of ahimsa, of Jain’s activism. The term is translated as ‘nonviolent observance of strict non-violence, the ideas he found resistance’, ‘nonviolent direct action’, ‘passive in Tolstoy and the Sermon on the Mount, the result resistance’ and even ‘militant nonviolence’. However, was a principle that evoked rich religious symbolism there is a fundamental difference between Satyagraha and contributed to a dynamic method of action unique and passive resistance. By the choice of the term to Indian history. The influence of Socrates to defy state Satyagraha, Gandhi distinguished the non-violent and face the consequences, Kasturba’s quiet submission actions of the Indian movement from the passive to his will and patient suffering also influenced Gandhi resistance to the European movements thereby to form his philosophy. His early childhood experience removing the cause of confusion and at the same time also played an important role. A Gujarat couplet, preparing the way for a better understanding of Indian learned in his childhood days, profoundly influenced aspirations in South Africa. Gandhi’s conscious and sub-conscious thinking: Satyagraha differs from Passive resistance as the “If a man gives you a drink of water and you North Pole from the South. To further elaborate give him a drink in return, that is nothing; Real beauty Passive resistance is power oriented, a method of consists in doing good against evil.” This basic securing rights by personal suffering: it is the reverse of appreciation of non-violence or soul force was resistance by arms. Satyagraha on the other hand is reinforced by Gandhi’s acquaintance with the Sermon truth oriented, a process of conflict –resolution by on the Mount. mutual understanding and by educating public opinion Satyagraha is further described as an unending, through reason, discussions and self – suffering. It dialectical quest for truth; it is holding on to truth come implies self-sacrifice, readiness to bear endless suffering what may. It requires no physical assistance or material bravely. Gandhi describes Satyagraha as not associated aid and is capable of being exercised by men, women with anger or motive. It is never fussy, never impatient, and children. It appeals to the common sense and and never vociferous. It is the direct opposite of morality of his adversary through words, purity, humility, compulsion. It was conceived as or complete substitute honesty and self-suffering. It is universally applicable, of violence. it is to violence, and therefore, to all tyranny, all injustice, However in Satyagraha, for Gandhi, ‘suffering what light is to darkness. love’ was the best way to do it, and formed the inspiring This brings us to understand the philosophy of principle of his new method. To put it in the words of Satyagraha. The philosophy rests on the postulate that National Seminar on Indian Philosophy: It’s Relevance in the 21st Century - 18th & 19th January, 2008 Joshi - Bedekar College, Thane / website : www.vpmthane.org 57 all individuals have souls residing in them, and an the individual who works but the power – the spiritual individual is not different from others though the colour force that is stronger than any physical force. The of the skin, race or varna may be different. As such, spiritual force overpowers the material force and the violence is not the law of our being. As Bhiku Parikh good ultimately wins over the evil. The means justifies states, ‘The use of violence denied the ontological facts the ends. The two opposing forces are wholly different that all human beings had souls, that they were capable in kind; the one moral and spiritual, the other physical of appreciating and pursuing good and that no one and material.
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