Gandhiji was one of the very few great men of the world who set the stamp of their personalities of an epoch.  In reality, Gandhiji was not just a man or a superman but a rare phenomenon that the world may witness once in a millennium. He ruled literally fifty crore of Indians for long thirty years, without any claim to power or authority; inspired them, guided them and finally led them to their inevitable destiny by providing them independence from British rule on August 15, 1947. Hence, it is most  appropriate to call Gandhiji a magician who hypnotized the people, a mystic who tried to impress the image of God upon the faces of brutes, a soldier  who fought with the weapons of a saint.

 With the real name Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, Gandhiji  has been bestowed with the titles, ‘Father of the Nation’, ‘Bapu’, and ‘Mahatma’.  He was the messenger of truth and non-violence by which he liberated our beloved motherland  from the British yoke. 

Truth and Gandhiji:-  Truth comes out breaking the thick walls of a fortress. The motto of “Satyamev Jayate” inscribed in our National Emblem  keeps announcing that “Truth Alone Triumphs”. The immediate question that comes to one’s mind is “What is Truth?” Gandhiji writes “Beyond the limited truths, however, there is one absolute Truth which is total and all embracing. But it is indescribable, because it is God.”  According to Gandhiji  all except Truth is unreal and false.  He dedicated his whole life to the wider purpose of discovering truth, or Satya. He tried to achieve this by learning from his own mistakes and conducting experiments on himself. He called his autobiography ‘The Story of My Experiments with Truth.’

But it is a matter of shame and sorrow that  ‘Truth’ has  really become unnecessary and irrelevant in today’s times. The grand motto of “Truth Alone Triumphs” (Satyamev Jayate) is just a dead body lying below the four lions that are just waiting to use it to satiate their hunger.  This motto has become  a false albeit  smart one-liner coined to fool gullible common men.  Now   for most of us and especially for our new generation, the Gandhian concept of  Truth is slowly fading away and the contradictions of Gandhi’s philosophy are  becoming too glaring. Most people wearing the mask of truth and honesty  have been making  large potholes filled with jealousy, rudeness, cruelty, intolerance, corruption,  double standardness,  leg-pulling, backbiting, treachery  which become very difficult to be filled with.

Hence, now the time has arrived to make proper realization of the Gandhian concept of ‘Truth’, otherwise our destruction is not so far.

Non-violence and Gandhiji:- For centuries it was the opinion of many in the world that  Ahimsa (nonviolence) was a subject limited to hermits or cave dwellers. They  believed that it was an individual matter and could be applied in the religious sphere only. Gandhiji, however, shattered this myth. He used Ahimsa in the political sphere and proved that it could be successfully applied in every walk of life  and at all levels- individual to international, so long as the applier’s intention is clear and full of       honesty. He declared nonviolence to be an active force and proved on several occasions that  Ahimsa is not the meek submission  before the will of the wrongdoer; rather Ahimsa is a fight using soul-force against the will of a tyrant, which ultimately yields     victory. In this regard through his own nonviolent actions, he astonished the whole world, making India free from British rule.

 Although Mahatma Gandhi was not the originator of the principle of non-violence, he was the first to apply it in the political field on a huge scale.  He  says, “When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love has always won. There have been tyrants and murderers and for a time they seem invincible, but in the end, they always fall- think of it, always.”

Gandhiji spoke of achieving victory over the injustices of the world’s mightiest empire through the nonviolent  actions of the individual. And as we know from our independence , his ambition was achieved. He expected the whole world and Indians in particular to be as warriors and develop nonviolence to the maximum possible extent. People should apply Ahimsa in their behaviors, ensuring their own personal freedom while securing freedom for all citizens of the world.

According to Gandhiji, the  science of war leads one to dictatorship, pure and simple. The science of non-violence alone can lead one to pure democracy. Power based on love is thousand times more effective and permanent than power derived from fear of punishment.  A society organized and run on the basis of complete non-violence would be the purest one. The people will instinctively render them every help and through mutual cooperation they will easily deal with the ever decreasing disturbances. Violent quarrels  and strikes will be few and far.  Similarly, there will be no room for communal disturbances. A nation or group which has made non-violence its final policy cannot be subjected to slavery even by the atom bomb.

But in our present society there is no sign of non-violence. Violence in words and deeds, and in the form of communal riots, terrorist activities have raised their ugly heads everywhere. In fact, violence has become omnipresent leaving very little space for peace and non-violence. Hence, Gandhian theory of non-violence is most indispensable  in the present context, otherwise; we have to pay a heavy price for it.