PERSPECTIVE

their victims. He backs up his criticism of Interpreting ’s Hind these professions in Hind Swaraj with a later suggestion for their nationalisation Rudolf C Heredia (CW, 68:97). Rationalist materialism: Technology is Gandhi’s Hind Swaraj is not rejection of the liberative contribution of but the expression of science, which in modern civilisation becomes an uncompro- modernity. Rather his effort can be interpreted as an attempt to mising rationalism. For Gandhi this is but integrate these positive elements with a liberating re-interpretation of a dangerously truncated humanism. His tradition. With his critique from within the tradition, Gandhi becomes incisive remark is much to the point: “Just the great synthesiser of contraries within and across traditions. as dirt is matter misplaced, reason misplaced is lunacy! I plead not for the suppression of Reason, but for a due GANDHI’s Hind Swaraj (HS) is surely a be overcome in our own consciousness recognition of that in us which sanctifies foundational text for any understanding of first [Nandy 1983:63]. Unless this ‘Intimate reason itself” (CW, 6:106). Certainly, the man and his mission. In dialogue with Enemy’ was exorcised and exiled, unless Gandhi is right in insisting on the un- the text in its context, with the author and we addressed this ‘Loss and Recovery of reasonableness of not setting any limits to among ourselves, we hope to locate the Self Under Colonialism’ (ibid), we would reason. text within it’s own horizon of meaning always be a people enslaved by one power More recently a post-modern world has and then interrogate it from within our or another, whether foreign or native. emphasised the aggressive and destructive own contemporary. For Gandhi’s text is Certainly, Gandhi would not want to march of this ‘age of reason’. However, “a proclamation of ideological indepen- exchange an external colonialism for an Gandhi would test his faith with his reason, dence” [Dalton 1993:16] he never com- internal one, a white sahib for a brown but he would not allow his reason to destroy promised, his “confession of the faith” one, or compensate the loss of ‘Hindustan’ his faith. What makes such technological [Nanda 1974:66] he never abandoned, “a with ‘Englistan’ (HS, Ch 4). rationalism even more destructive in rather incendiary manifesto” [Erikson British colonialism was first Gandhi’s view, is its flawed materialism. 1969:217] to enkindle his revolution. No justified by a supposedly Christianising That is, the negation of the spiritual, the wonder it was banned by the colonial mission, but very soon this was articulated transcendent, or in other words, the denial government in 1910 for fear of sedition. in terms of a civilising one. In rejecting of a religious worldview. this modern civilisation, Gandhi is For Gandhi truth, was much more than I subverting the legitimacy of the colonial could be grasped by science or reason. For Gandhi’s Critique of the Modern enterprise at its core. For there could be him there was a reality beyond that West no colonialism without a civilising mission perceived by the senses. It is this trans- For Gandhi civilisation was by definition [Nandy 1983:11] since it could hardly be cendent reality that gave meaning and a moral enterprise: “Civilisation is that sustained in India by brute force. value to our present one. In this Gandhi mode of conduct which points out to man Industrial capitalism: Gandhi sees is very much in the mainstream of Hindu the path of duty” (HS, Ch 13). Hence it capitalism as the dynamic behind colonial tradition. Indeed, most religious traditions is the very basic ethos of this modern west imperialism. Lenin too had said as much, would be similarly sensitive to such a that Gandhi sets himself against. For he and like Marx, Gandhi’s rejection of transcendent world, even when it is not finds two unacceptable and unethical capitalism is based on a profound repug- perceived as wholly other-worldly. In a principles at its very core: ‘might is right’ nance to a system where profit is allowed more secular world today we may not be and the ‘survival of the fittest’. The first to degrade labour, where the machines are sympathetic to such a worldview. And yet legitimated the politics of power as valued more than humans, where auto- a materialism that is deterministic leaves expounded earlier by Machiaveli; the mation is preferred to humanism. no scope for human freedom and hope. second idealised the economics of self- It was this that moved Gandhi to his Gandhi emphasises this reaching out to a interest as proposed by Adam Smith. In somewhat hyperbolic claim: “Machinery beyond, that gives this freedom and hope the west “with rare exceptions, alternatives is the chief symbol of modern civilisation; its dynamism and a reach beyond its grasp. to western civilisation are always sought it represents a great sin” (HS, Ch 19). within its own basic thought system” [Saran However, by 1919 his views on machinery II 1980:681]. do begin to change right up to 1947, as Relevance of Gandhi’s Critique The three recurrent themes in Hind he gradually comes to concede some Today Swaraj which we will discuss here are: positive aspects like time and labour saving, Gandhi’s critique of modern civilisation colonial imperialism, industrial capitalism, even as he warns against the negative ones does overlook many of its strengths: its and rationalist materialism. of concentrating wealth and displacing scientific and critical spirit of inquiry: its Colonial imperialism: Gandhi cate- workers [Parel 1997:164-70]. He was human control over the natural world; its gorically insisted that “the English have acutely sensitive to how machinery can organisational capacity. Such achievement not taken India; we have given it to them. dehumanise and technology alienate, and would imply a certain ‘spiritual dimension’ They are not in India because of their he extends his critique to the professions that Gandhi seems to have missed [Parekh strength: but because we keep them” of medicine and law (HS, Chs 11, 12). 1997:35]. However, the focus of his criti- (HS, Ch 7). He was one of the earliest to The poor hardly benefit from these cism is modern civilisation of a specific realise that colonialism was something to professional services, though they are often period; his condemnation of colonialism

Economic and Political Weekly June 12, 1999 1497 focuses on its imperialistic inspiration; his Moreover, the west is still the centre of now seems to have turned on itself with rejection of industrialism derives mostly our world for we have not the self-respect, the post-modern revolt. But this has thrown from its capitalist context; his apprehen- the self-reliance, the self-sufficiency to up its own irrationalities. It seems to have sions about rationality regard its truncation centre ourselves and so we condemn our- lost the liberating project that was implicit by materialism. selves to remain on the periphery of in modernity. For the kind of relativising However, once the real limitations of someone else’s centre. For the colonial and subjectivising of ethics that post- Gandhi’s critique are acknowledged, then masters had stripped our collective identity modernism has led to, undermines the we can better contextualise and interpret of any intrinsic dignity by denigrating us claims of any justice. For there can hardly his relevance for us today, whether this as a cowardly and passive people. Gandhi be any mutually accepted legitimacy to be with regard to politics in our neo- sought to reverse the damage to our arbitrate conflicting claims, when con- colonial world, or technologies in our post- collective psyche by his “redefinition of sensus irrevocably breaks down. So, might industrial times, or culture in our post- courage and effective resistance in terms becomes right, and the power its own modern age. These will now be some of of, or through non-violence” [Roy legitimation. the issues on which we must allow Gandhi 1986:185]. Gandhi’s trenchant critique of modernity to interrogate us. For “the kinds of questions The issue then of our identity as a nation was focused on modernist rationalism, but Gandhi asked nearly eight decades ago are and a people still remains to be resolved. it was equally opposed to a post-modern the ones which now face both the under- Such identities are only viable in a rejection of rationality. What Gandhi was developed and the post-industrial societies genuinely multicultural world. Gandhi’s pleading for is a richer concept of rationality caught up in a deep upsurge of confusion urging in this regard is certainly relevant and a meta-theory of rationalism [Parekh and disillusionment” [Sethi 1979:3]. today in our own society where the 1995:165-66]. He wanted to contain exces- Neo-colonialism: Gandhi’s rejection of propagation of a cultural nationalism is sive rationality within reasonable bounds the supposedly civilising mission of growing every day. Yet “nothing could be without an irrational revolt against reason colonialism brings into question the whole more anti-Indian than attempts to make an itself, but he would emphatically reject legitimacy of colonial rule, at a funda- ideology of Indianness and to fight, instead any forced choice between totalising mental ethical level. He would have India of incorporating or bypassing non- rationalism and relativising subjectivism. unlearn much that she has from the modern Indianness” [Nandy 1980:112]. west. For if Indians “would but revert to Post-industrialism: With the new III their own glorious civilisation, either technologies there was much hope for a Gandhi’s Affirmation of Indian the English would adopt the latter and new freedom from degrading and mono- Culture become Indianised or find their occupation tonous work. However, what seems to Gandhi’s Hind Swaraj presents us with in India gone” (HS, Preface to English have come in to replace this degrading an idealised version of Indian culture that edition). monotony is not a new dignity of labour is completely counterpunctal to the Thus, he opens up a host of ethical but rather a compulsive consumerist ‘modern west’. Here we pick out three issues between the coloniser and the society, which is but dehumanising in seminal themes: swaraj, swadeshi and colonised, the dominant and the dominated, newer ways. This should hardly surprise satya. the oppressor and oppressed. The post- us since the ethic underlying post- Swaraj: Gandhi radically re-interprets colonial era brought such issues into industrialism is the same as that which ‘swaraj’ and gives it a dual meaning. The sharper focus across the world. Now with underpinned industrial capitalism, namely, original Gujarati text uses ‘swaraj’ in both globalisation leading to a unipolar world, the profit motive and the market senses. Gandhi’s English translation makes such concerns with empowerment and mechanism. the duality explicit: swaraj as ‘self-rule’ disempowerment, dependency and inter- Gandhi’s critique was precisely a con- and as ‘self-government’. The first as self- dependency, have gained, not lost their demnation of these. If we find his ideas control, rule over oneself, was the founda- urgency. Moreover, closer home this of a little naive and impractical, tion for the second, self-government. In widening divide bears down on us more we still have no alternative answer to this second sense, local self-government decisively than ever before. humanising a system that seems to have was what Gandhi really had in mind. Our new economic policy increasingly betrayed what possibilities it might have Gandhi very decidedly gives priority to represents a whole new vision of society, had of bringing freedom and dignity to the self-rule over self-government, and to both that takes for granted the internal toiling masses. Moreover, technology has over political independence, swatantrata. colonialism we are experiencing today, as its own intrinsic dynamism, that instru- Essential to both meanings of swaraj, for instance between Bharat and India, the mentalises our world and inevitably leads was a sense of self-respect that is precisely bahujan and the twice-born jatis, the avarna to a disenchantment that bring us to the Gandhi’s answer to colonial rule. For and the savarna castes, the toiling masses ‘iron cage’, as Weber warned long ago. Gandhi freedom in its most fundamental and the privileged classes, the oppressed Our environmental crises are surely a sense had to mean freedom for self- people and the oppressor groups, the manifestation of this loss of innocence, realisation. But it had to be a freedom for minority traditions and the majority one. even to the point when we want newer all, for the toiling masses, and the privileged Thus, our post-colonial world can only technologies to repair the damage already classes, and most importantly for the least be described as a neo-colonial one, inter- done by the older ones. Gandhi was and last Indian. In this sense, nationally divided into developed and precisely rejecting such a naive “nineteenth was precisely the patriotism that Gandhi developing nations, as also intra-nationally century optimism which sought for the espoused. It focused on people’s welfare between privileged and underprivileged positive sciences the liberation of not on national pride: “By patriotism I citizens. Moreover, these divisions are humanity” [Nandy 1986:102]. But such mean the welfare of the whole people, mutually reinforced, not just economically anti-modernism then was ahead of its time! and, if I could secure it at the hands of and politically but culturally and socially Post-modernism: The excessive and the English, I should bow down my head as well. aggressive rationalism of the age of reason, to them” (HS, Ch 15). So he could write:

1498 Economic and Political Weekly June 12, 1999 “my patriotism is for me a stage on my a dream, a happening, a culture. As he It was basically a method of dialogue that journey to the land of freedom and peace” used “the term ‘village’ implied not an would bring two disagreeing parties not (, April 13, 1924, p 112). And entity, but a set of values” [Sethi 1979:23]. just into mutual agreement, but into the yet swaraj was not something given by the It brought together his three basic themes realisation of a deeper truth together. The leaders, Indian or British, it was something of swaraj: self-respect, self-realisation and dichotomy between the oppressor and that had to be taken by the people for self-reliance. the oppressed is transcended in this themselves. In privileging the rural over the urban, ‘heightened mutuality’, but even beyond Clearly, the foundation of swaraj in both Gandhi was arguing for a minimal state, this “ ruptures the tricotomy its senses had to be threefold: self-respect, since he saw the state essentially as an among the oppressor, oppressed and self-realisation and self-reliance. This is instrument of violence. It was only in the emancipator” [Pantham 1986:179]. for it what Gandhi tried to symbolise with the communal cauldron at the time of partition, seeks to involve all three in this quest for chakra and , both much mis- that he began to see the need of state power greater self-realisation of the truth. From understood symbols today. For Gandhi to contain and end the violence. And yet the satyagrahi as the initiator, this required khadi “is the symbol of the unity of Indian our experience of the post-colonial state a demanding discipline. humanity, of its economic freedom and in this country would bear out his appre- But satyagraha was also a political equality and therefore ultimately in the hensions even as we seem to be careening strategy. In Hind Swaraj Gandhi defines poetic expression of , into anarchy. Gandhi perhaps did not fully ‘passive resistance’ as he called it then, the livery of India’s freedom” (CW 75:146- appreciate the role of the state as an agency as “a method of securing rights by personal 66). Today the chakra and khadi have not for regeneration and redistribution, in suffering” (HS, Ch 17). Clearly, “Gandhi’s retained this powerful multivalent planning and co-ordination. But he was satyagraha then was an ingenious com- symbolism. acutely sensitive to the centralised state bination of reason, morality and politics; Yet the ethic that Gandhi was trying to appropriating what belonged to the local it appealed to the opponent’s head, heart introduce and inscribe into Indian political community and the individual. He was and interests” [Parekh 1995:156]. life was that “real swaraj will not be the deeply suspicious of power being used in This was a “vernacular model of action” acquisition of authority by a few but the the cause of freedom or to contain violence. [Parekh 1995:211] that the people acquisition of the capacity of all to resist His swadeshi was an attempt to address understood. But it was Gandhi who first authority when it is abused” [Prabhu this complex dialectic on an ethical rather used it so effectively to moblise them and 1961:4-5]. For Gandhi “Civilisation is that than a political foundation. to appeal to their oppressors. In fact he mode of conduct which points out to man Satya: For Gandhi truth was not a matter was the first leader to bring non-violence the path duty” (HS, Ch 13). The basis then of theory but of practice. His autobiography to centre stage in the struggle for freedom of his swaraj could not be just rights, it entitled Experiments with Truth, is surely with the British. He was well aware that had to be duties as well. For Gandhi real an indication of this. But Gandhi’s truth adopting “methods of violence to drive rights are legitimated by duties they flow has little to do with experimental science, out the English” would be a “suicidal from, for both are founded on satya and concerned with external prediction. Rather policy” (HS, Ch 15). And his Hind Swaraj dharma. The modern theory of rights his truth was an experiential one, a reflexive was precisely intended to stymie such a reverses this priority and founds rights on understanding of oneself very much in the soul-destroying venture. the dignity and freedom of the individual. tradition of the Buddha and the ancient Gandhi’s re-interpretation: Gandhi But comprehensive morality can never be rishis of this land. The whole of Gandhi’s locates himself as an insider to mainstream adequately articulated or correctly grasped life’s journey was not to predict the , the ‘sanathan dharma’. Hence, in terms of rights alone. outcome of his life’s struggle, but rather the radicality of his re-interpretation goes Swadeshi: Swadeshi is the means for to interpret and direct the struggles of the unnoticed. Gandhi does not reject, he Gandhi’s quest for swaraj. Fundamentally masses for what they themselves could simply affirms what he considers to be it meant ‘localism’. This was not an isolated legitimately claim. authentic, and allows the inauthentic to be localism of the “deserted village”, that For Gandhi satya, was an absolute reality sloughed off. For “Gandhi’s Hinduism Goldsmith romanticed, or the degradation that we could only partially grasp. Thus was ultimately reduced to a few funda- of caste oppression that Ambedkar revolted the many-sidedness of truth that we mental beliefs: the supreme reality of God, against, but rather the local neighbourhood experience is nothing but a consequence the ultimate unity of all life and the value community, the village as the node in a of such relative knowledge. Overcoming of love () as a means of realising network of oceanic circles that over-lapped these limitations of our ‘relative know- God” [Nanda 1985:86]. His profound and spread out in its ever widening ledge’ for a more comprehensive grasp of redefinition of Hinduism gave it a radically embrace. It is this commitment of the this ‘absolute truth’ could never be forced novel orientation. In sum, “Gandhi’s individual to his ‘desh’ that was Gandhi’s by violence. Only ahimsa, non-violence, Hinduism had a secularised content but Indian alternative to western nationalism could make the quest for such truth viable. a spiritual form and was at once both [Parekh 1995:56-57]. Gandhi operationalised this quest in his secular and non-secular” [Parekh Gandhi perceived that power in India strategy of satyagraha, or truth-force. 1995:109]. was inevitably monopolised by the urban Moreover, he makes no ethical separation Thus one of the most remarkable and elite, at the expense of village folk, and between means and an end. Both must be yet unremarked re-interpretations of was trying to reverse this dependency to morally good. For him “the goal did not Hinduism that Gandhi effected was that make the state serve the weaker sections. exist at the end of a series of actions of the Gita, a text intended to persuade His was an egalitarian ,not just a romantic, designed to achieve it, it shadowed them a reluctant warrior on the legitimacy and inspiration. Mao attempted as much in from the very beginning” [Parekh even the necessity of joining the battle. China. But the village Gandhi idealised 1995:142]. Gandhi reworks its ‘nishkamakarma’ to was not just a geographic place, or a Thus, satyagraha was not just a political become the basis of his ahimsa and statistic, or a social class. It was an event, strategy, it was both a means and an end. satyagraha!

Economic and Political Weekly June 12, 1999 1499 We have only to contrast Gandhi’s grasped its fundamental strength and the known by the beautiful name Bhangi, that Hinduism with V D Savarkar’s hindutva secret of its survival. is to say the reformer or remover of all to see how starkly contrapunctal they are! dirt” (Harijan, July 7, 1946, p 212). Hence, in spite of its pretensions to be IV But if Gandhi’s quest for equality is nationalist and modern, its militant Our World Today something that our complex world cannot chauvinism and authoritarian funda- We must now situate ourselves with accommodate, we seem to have given up mentalism make hindutva the very regard to the critical issues of our world not just this ideal of equality, but even the antithesis of Gandhi’s Hinduism. Hindutva today to enter into dialogue with him. Here quest for equity in the distribution of the is in fact but a contemporary synthesis of we have chosen three such issues as being rewards and burdens of our society. And brahmanism! This is why in the end the the most fruitful for this encounter: the yet today Gandhi’s proletarian ‘levelling Mahatma is vehemently opposed by the collapse of socialism and the crisis of down’ certainly seems to be much more traditional Hindu elite, who felt threatened capitalism, gobalisation in an inter- viable that Tagore’s elitist ‘levelling up’. by the challenge he posed. dependent world, and the unresolved In such a scenario the relevance of Gandhi’s But precisely because he presents himself violence of our atomic age. idea of sarvodaya as the goal of swaraj is as a Hindu in his interpretation of Indian Post-socialism: In our present world, something we need to re-examine. culture, he was seen as too inclusive by the socialist ideal is being discredited as Certainly, a decentralised participative traditional , and at the same time a god that failed, when it is rather the once democratic and humane society, is a more as not ecumenical enough by contemporary socialist states that have collapsed. attractive, and one may dare say, a more non-Hindus. Hence his appeals for Hindu- Moreover, today the crisis of capitalism vialable ideal today, than the kind of Muslim unity were rejected, by the Muslims is everyday more apparent, with the consumerism and inequitous divisions that as being too Hindu, and questioned by the collapse of the much acclaimed Asian the new economic policy in our country Hindus for not being Hindu enough. tigers as the new model for the cornucopia seems to welcome. Gandhi’s failure to bridge the religious of development and progress; and the Indeed, the principle of subsidiarity divide between Hindu and Muslim, was growing unemployment in the west cannot seems to be the only viable solution to matched in many ways by his failure to but presage further crises there as well. national governments that are too large to bridge the caste divide between dalits and With liberalisation and privatisation as address local problems, while being too others. He never quite understood Jinnah, accepted policy in our country today, the small to cope with global ones. Today the or his appeal to Muslim nationalism. One Bharat verses India divide, that Gandhi 73rd and 74th amendment to the could say the same in regard to Ambedkar had intuited long ago, is, if anything, rapidly Constitution once again affirm panchayati and dalits, who have never forgotten or and disastrously growing. Only now the raj and tribal self-rule. We are coming forgiven Gandhi for the imposition of the elite of Bharat seems to have been co- back to a devolution of powers that Gandhi Pune Pact. We can only wonder now opted by the privileged of India, even as had urged in his ideal of swaraj and had whether separate electorates for dalits the refugees of India have been forced into tried to have written in to our Constitution. then would have made reservations for an urbanised Bharat. Hopefully this will be a presage of more them unnecessary now. What we do know Much has been made about the dis- to come. is that the caste divide has only deepened agreements between Gandhi and Nehru. Globalisation: Globalisation and the with increasing conflict and indeed the But in the exchange of letters in 1945 alienating homogeneity that it must same can be said about the religious divide [Parel 1997:149-56], it is quite clear that inevitably promote, is the very opposite and religious conflict in this country. the axis of their reconciliation was pre- of the localism and the celebration of Yet for Gandhi the unity of humankind cisely around this quest for equality. Their diversity that Gandhi’s swadeshi was meant was premised on the oneness of the cosmos, paths may have been different but Nehru’s to encourage. However, Gandhi’s principle which was a philosophical principle that socialism and Gandhi’s swaraj were of swadeshi, “simply means that the most was ontologically prior to diversity. Once both oriented to this quest for equity and effective organisation of social, economic the legitimacy of religious diversity is equality across all the divides, of caste, and political functions must follow the rooted in the fundamental Jaina principle class, region, etc. natural contours of the neighbourhood,” of ‘anekantavada’, the many sidedness of Gandhi was quite radical in urging thus affirming “the primacy of the truth, then religious tolerance is a necessary equality, even more so than the com- immediate community” [Roy 1985:114]. consequence – not a negative tolerance of munists. He would have equal wages and Gandhi’s “goodness politics” as it has distance and coexistence, but rather one bread labour for all. In his ‘Constructive been called [Saran 1980:691], could only of communication and enrichment Programme’ (CW, 75:146-66). Gandhi’s really operate on such a scale. For “Gandhi [Heredia 1997]. concept of equality is not grounded in decentralisation means the creation of In cultural matters, Gandhi wanted all impersonal and competitive individualism, parallel politics in which the people’s cultures to be enriched by each other as it seems to be in the west, but in co- power is institutionalised to counter the without losing their identity. But such operative and compassionate non-violence, centralising and alienating forces of the cultural assimilation, was opposed by on ‘fraternity’ not just ‘liberty’. In the modern state....Thus the Gandhian political revivalists and religious begining, he saw no contradiction between decentralised polity has a built-in process nationalists. Yet for Gandhi open and such fraternal equality and the idealised of the withering away of the state” [Sethi understanding dialogue must precede, not hierarchy of varna. But in his later years 1986:229]. follow, a free and adaptive assimilation. he reversed himself to urge that “classless But before this is dismissed as too naive Thus, an enriched diversity would then society is the ideal, not merely to be at or impractical for our sophisticated and contribute to a more invigourated pluralism aimed at but to be worked for” (Harijan, complicated world, we might pause to and an enhanced unity. This was precisely February 17, 1946, p 9). By now he was think of the kind of politics our centralised Gandhi’s understanding of Indian culture promoting inter-caste marriages and states have in fact spawned. The very and civilisation, and he had, indeed, hoping “there would be only one caste hegemonic homogeneity it promotes

1500 Economic and Political Weekly June 12, 1999 succeeds less at obliterating difference However, the Gandhian ideal was a interpreted as an attempt to integrate these than at alienating minorities and enkindling community modelled on the joint family positive elements with a liberating re- their resentment. On the contrary, to take and on varna as a non-competitive division interpretation of tradition, even as some a lesson from ecology, micro-variability of labour. Later in his life his own see him as radical and others as reactionary. is needed for macro-stability in political promotion of inter-caste marriages testifies With his critique from within the tradition, and economic systems as well. to a change in his views. Yet even as we Gandhi becomes the great synthesiser of Gandhi’s swadeshi could never mean critique such Gandhian ideas, we must contraries if not of contradictions, within ethnocentrism. Unlike some Hindu and discover in dialogue what value and and across traditions. Muslim ‘nationalists’ Gandhi never used relevance they have for us today. For His ‘purna (comprehensive) swaraj’ ‘nationalism’ for narrow sectarian pur- ultimately Gandhi insists on both: that the would harmonise rights and duties, head poses. He mobilised his people as ‘Indians’ community is not a mere means for the and heart, individual and community, faith not as Hindus or Muslims. His nationalism self-interest of the individual and that the and reason, economic development and was anti-imperialistic not chauvinistic, a individual in not a mere resource for the spiritual progress, religious commitment struggle for political justice and cultural concerns of the community. And this would and religious pluralism, self-realisation dignity [Nandy 1994:3]. He was a patriot go for the community of communities, and political action. He brings together who wanted “ to be that our global community must be. philosophical discourse and popular non-violent, anti-militaristic and therefore Violence: There can be no negating the culture in enlightened renewal and social a variant of universalism” [Nandy liberation that modernity has brought in reform. Not since the time of the Buddha, 1995:14]. He was only too aware of the our post -modern world to vast masses of some have argued, has such a synergy number of ‘nationalities’ that could be people. But for all its much vaulted between the philosophic and the popular moblised in India, once the genie was out ‘rationality’ some would rather say because in our traditions been experienced. Thus, of the bottle! of it, modernity has failed to cope with Gandhi integrates the Upanishad and the An ecological understanding is now this endemic irrationality of violence. If Tulsi Ramayan in his religious synthesis. propelling us to a new and deep realisation Gandhi’s ahimsa seems impractical, what When it comes to bridges across traditions, of our interdependence. We have only one are the alternative we have trapped our- Gandhi brings the Gita together with the earth, we must learn to share and care. We selves in? If Gandhi was right that “ to ‘’ and reads one into are but a contingent part of the cosmos, arm India on a large scale is to Europeanise the other. In fact, if he has Christianised debtors born, whose proper response to it,” (HS, Ch 15) then what would nuclear Hinduism he has certainly also presented life must be the ‘yagna’, service-offering arms do? Americanise us? And this is an us with a Hinduised Christian spirituality. of our lives for others [Parekh 1995:88]. initiative being pushed by our cultural Precisely as a re-interpretation from Thus, with regard to the economy and nationalists! But then in a globalised world within, Gandhi can so much to more polity, Gandhi would have the village as it is surely only the elite that will get to effectively and authentically integrate into his world; but with regard to culture and strut and fret upon this global stage, while his synthesis elements from without. Thus religion, it was the world that was his the masses of our people are a passive and he reconciles meaningful faith and village! Surely, here we have a viable manipulated audience to this theatre of the reasonable modernity. In the best traditions example of thinking globally and acting macabre. of this land he combined both faith and locally. Indeed, our global ecological crisis The whole effort of the modern world reason, for each is implicated in each other. has begun to press on us anew the relevance in dealing with violence has been to control Gandhi would constantly critique faith to of Gandhi’s paradoxical ideas. For the the other. But mastery over others has not ascertain whether it was meaningful and institutional individualism that seemed meant less violence for ourselves. Only reasonable in terms of basic human value to be the very foundation of the democratic now we become the perpetrators, not the commitments. And so too he would quest in the west seems quite inade- sufferers of violence. Gandhi’s attempt demand of reason the same fidelity to quate to the ecological crises of today. For begins with controlling oneself – as the these values as well. it privileges individual rights over the first source of violence one must master However, the ascetic dimension of common good. But even enlightened self- in order to fearlessly and non-violently Gandhi’s integration at times loses the interest has no answer to the ‘tragedy win over the violent others. His concern aesthetic one. A criticism of Gandhi’s of the commons’ accept an external was with “socialising the individual ashrams was that it grew only vegetables coercion. conscience rather than internalising the not flowers [Parekh 1995:209]. Growing However, for Gandhi, “individuality” social conscience” [Iyer 1973:123]. Cer- vegetables represented more than the must be “oriented to self-realisation tainly Gandhi has much relevance to our Gandhian pre-occupation with vege- through self-knowledge... in a network of present need to once again bridge this tarianism and bread-labour. But in rightly interdependence and harmony informed dichotomy between rights and duties, and emphasising the need for renunciation, by ahimsa” [Roy 1986a:84]. Nor was this integrate both in a more comprehensive certainly a message that our consumerist to be an interdependence of dominant- freedom of choice and the obligation of and self-indulgent world needs more than subservient relationships so prevalent in conscience, in a humanist worldview and ever today, the Gandhian ashram seemed our local communities and global societies. a more genuinely humane world- to miss out on the need for celebration, His swadeshi envisaged a more per- community. This is our only real chance which our tired and alienated, dis-spirited sonalised and communitarian society on for peace in our now globally inter- and pessimistic world needs almost as a human scale, yet extending to include dependent world. much. both the biotic and even the cosmic Gandhi’s synthesis: Gandhi’s Hind A re-interpretation of Gandhi would community. This was the logical extension Swaraj is not a rejection of the liberative precisely allow such a celebration. While of the Jaina doctrine of ‘syadvada’, that contribution of modernity: civil liberties, Gandhi’s understanding of ‘moksha’ as everything is related to everything in the religious tolerance, equality, poverty service is a seminal breakthrough, even universe in ‘a great chain of being’. alleviation. Rather his effort can be this can be enriched by affirming, not

Economic and Political Weekly June 12, 1999 1501 negating the other dimensions of life. It phatically the need to find new ways of University Press, Delhi. is only thus that we will be able to bring redefining ourselves and understanding –(1995): ‘Unity in Nationalism: Pitfalls of some wholeness to, in Iris Murdoch’s our problems, before we can begin to Imported Concepts’, The Times of India, October 4, Mumbai. unforgettable phrase, the “broken totality,” respond to the situation. Nehru, Jawaharlal (1958): A Bunch of Old Letters, of our modern world. [This paper is based on a presentation made at London. department of Philosophy, Pune University for Pantham, Thomas (1986): ‘Proletarian Pedagogy, VI Satyagraha and Charisma: On Gramci and Conclusion: Partners in Dialogue a seminar on ‘Rethinking Swaraj’, June 25- 27,1998. My thanks to Mahesh Gavaskar and Gandhi’ in R Roy (ed) Contemporary Crisis Gandhi’s life was a continuing series of others for their comments on an earlier draft.] and Gandhi, op cit, pp 165-89. Parekh, Bhikhu (1995): Gandhi’s Political controversies and contestations with those References Philosophy: A Critical Appreciation, Ajanta, in power on behalf of the powerless. He Delhi. never lacked opponents, among the British Chambers, Robert (1983): Rural Development: Parel, Anthony J (ed) (1997): Gandhi: Hind Swaraj and even the Indian elites, and often found Putting the Last First, Longman, London. and Other Writings, Foundation Books, New himself isolated and alone particularly at Dalton, Dennis (1993): : Non- Delhi. the end of his life, which was far from Violent Power in Action, New York. Prabhu, R K (1961): Compiler, Democracy: Real Erikson, Erik H, (1966): Gandhi’s Truth: On the and Deceptive, Navajivan Publication, being one long triumphant procession. Origins of Militant Non-Violence, Norton, Ahmedabad. Yet one of the great contributions of Gandhi New York. Roy, Ramashray (ed) (1986): Contemporary Crisis was precisely his centring of the periphery: Heredia, Rudolf C (1997): ‘Tolerance and Dialogue and Gandhi, Discovery Publishing House, in politics with ‘anthyodaya’; in religion as Responses to Pluralism and Ethnicity’, Delhi. by de-brahamising Hinduism, de-insti- Social Action, Vol 47, No 3, pp 346-64. – (1986a): ‘Modern Predicament and Gandhi’ in tutionalising practice and personalising Iyer, Raghavan (1973): The Moral and Political Contemporary Crisis and Gandhi, op cit, pp Thought of Mahatma Gandhi, Oxford 44-88. belief; in education by his proposal for University Press, Oxford. – (1984): Gandhi: Soundings in Political ‘’ or basic education as it came Nanda, B R (1985): Gandhi and His Critics, Philosophy, Chanakya Publications, Delhi. to be called; in the economy by Oxford University Press, Delhi. – (1984a): Self and Society: A Study of Gandhian symbolically urging khadhi. Not all of Nandy, Ashish (1980): At the Edge of Psychology: Thought, Sage Publication, New Delhi. these efforts were successful or perhaps Essays in Politics and Culture, Oxford Saran, A K (1980): ‘Gandhi and the Concept of even practical, but they did make a University Press, Delhi. Politics: Towards a Normal Civilisation’, – (1983): The Intimate Enemy: Loss and Recovery Gandhi Marg, Vol 1, No 11, February, contribution which is still valid today. of Self Under Colonialism, Oxford University pp 682-83. And all Gandhi’s original ideas can be Press, Delhi. Sethi, J D (1979): Gandhian Values and 20th found seeded already in his Hind Swaraj. – (1986): From Outside the Imperium: Gandhi’s Century Challenges, Today we need a new developmental Cultural Critique of the West in Ramashray Publication, Division, New Delhi. model, and increasingly people are Roy (ed), Contemporary Crisis and Gandhi, –(1986): ‘Gandhi and Development: A European beginning to see that, it has to begin by pp 89-126. View’ in R Roy (ed) Contemporary Crisis – (1994): The Illegitimacy of Nationalism, Oxford and Gandhi, op cit, pp 190-231. “Putting the Last First” [Chambers 1983], to come back to the last Indian that Gandhi would have as the talisman of our social SOME CHALLENGING BOOKS planning. No one can claim that Gandhi’s by Paramesh Choudhury reformist appeal has fulfilled the ‘revolution of raising expectations’ of our 1. Kashmir to Palestine – Rs. 480.00, P. 380 masses. This only underscores the need for a more fine-tuned analysis and a wider Jesus escaped from the Cross to India. Later, he died in India, his ancestral dialogue in our society for constructive land, where he spent 14 to 30 years of his life, to get lessons on change given the limits of reformism and and religions. the constraints on revolution. If we are looking for a new synthesis for a counter- 2. The Aryan Hoax – Rs. 490.00, P. 450 culture, we must take Gandhi as a dialogue Know the Truth, speak the Truth! partner in this project but first we must UNESCO says: ‘To speak of an Aryan ‘race’ or ‘people’ is a mere myth’. redefine and re-interpret him. Such an Vivekananda remarked, ‘All these monstrous lies are taught to our boys!’ encounter will help us to re-examine and Vol. V, P. 537 reconstruct ourselves as well. Gandhi has been severely criticised as 3. The India We Have Lost – Rs. 280.00, P. 248 impractical, as someone who took out an This is an anthology of essays taken from the Asiatic Researches (1775 to impossible overdraft on human moral 1804). Discover the India which the British convinced us, did not exist. That resources. But this is to claim that human India colonised and civilised Greece, Egypt and Mesopotamia, that India was beings are not capable of a metanoia, a the paradise of the Bible. radical change of heart, that can open up new perspectives, not just for individuals 4. N. E. India – The Cradle of the Chinese Nation – Rs. 590.00, P. 625 and groups, but for entire societies and whole cultures as well. We need organic Sir William Jones wrote that the Chinese are of Indian origin (Asiatic intellectuals and transformative activists Researches, Vol. II). The author carried on extensive research to trace who can articulate and precipitate such a out the full ’s great achievement. social movement. The cascading crises (Mahabodhy Book Agency – 4A, Bankim Chatterjee St., Cal-700 073). that our society and our world is ex- periencing, only underlines more em-

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