Mahatma Gandhi & Winston Churchill, The Leading Figures of the Century

He derived the idea from his reading material of Henry Thoreau, Leo Tolstoy, the New Testament, and the Hindu scriptures, and he called his manner satyagraha, or truth- or soul-force. He was imprisoned many measure for his non-violent campaigns (Homer, 1996). He stated at first that this would be a program of " peaceful protection," but he did non resembling his own description and sought a nonher. For one thing, he did not want an essentially Indian campaign to be k presently by an English name. He also decided that the termination gave rise to a misunderstanding, noting how a European sympathizer at a public meeting had described dormant resistance as a "weapon of the weak." Gandhi did not like this interlingual rendition of the movement and denied that Indians were weak or passive. He saw their passive resistance as "soul-force," something far stronger than brute, physical force. Hence, the name satyagraha was to be used, made from satya (truth) implying love, and agraha (firmness) serving as a synonym for force, so that the word means "the Force which is born of Truth and grapple or non-violence" (Moon, 1969, 52).

Because of the misunderstandings and concerns noted above, Gandhi took pains to make it clear that satyagraha differs from passive resistance in that it renounces physical force completely and not for expediency but as a matter of teaching:

In ordinary passive resistance, physical force is eschewed because it appears to can no hope of success, but it might be use

Gandhi and his nonviolent methods had much to do with creating a consensus against the command of the British and allowed the people to express their dissatisfaction in a way that appealed to the conscience of the world. The violence in the 1922 campaign was a disservice to the cause and allowed the British to retaliate, though the violence of that reaction did not do credit to the British, either.

Gandhi was then 45 historic period of age. He established an ashram near Ahmadabad and worked for the causes of Indian peasants and mill workers.

He did not at first oppose the British rule of India, and he helped recruit Indians for World War I. He intend his first all-India satyagraha campaign in 1919 when the British passed the Rowlatt Act act the wartime curtailment of Indian civil liberties. When some Indians resorted to mob violence, the British took harsh reprisals, including a massacre at Amritsar in which 379 Indians were killed. Gandhi was now a firm opponent of the British Empire. He would bulge out his second satyagraha in 1920 with a boycott of British cloth. He was arrested in 1922 for sedition and sentenced to six years in prison. He was released in 1924 and became the president of the Indian National Congress (Homer, 1996).

d if suitable occasion arose for it. In satyagraha physical force is altogether forbidden even in the most favorable circumstances. Gandhi maintain that satyagraha also differed from passive resistance because in the latter on that point is always present the idea of harassing the other party, whereas "in satyagraha on that point is not the remotest idea of injuring the opponent. Satyagraha postulates the conquest of the adversary by scummy in one's own person" (Moon 52-53).

Homer, A.J. (1996). "Gandhi." Colliers Encyclopedia CD-ROM.

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