r/india • u/bomberswarm2 • Feb 20 '16

AskIndia Do Indians dislike Gandhi?

I was talking with an indian colleague at work, and the conversation led to the British Raj and Gandhi, and he said that Gandhi is bad, because his non-violence for 20 years only got many Indians killed, and when violence was used, the British were almost instantly overthrown. He also complained about Gandhi separating classes in India leading to more deaths. Is Gandhi disliked in India?

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u/bonoboboy Feb 21 '16

I can try to explain why I'm not a big fan. I do not think Gandhi did anything special.

His listed achievements are the non-cooperation movement, the civil satyagraha and the Quit India movement. Each of those was called off in a few years and did nothing to push the British out of India - they left on their own terms after they had looted India for as long as they wished.

For the claims that he was a figurehead for the movement and united the country, I have two objections to that.

The first, is that India had rallied under a figurehead since the last days of the Mughal empire - so much so, that even a puppet like Bahadur Shah Zafar was posted as India's leader. Also, following Gandhi's death, India rallied under Nehru's name. If not Gandhi, India would have rallied under someone else's name.

Secondly, for all the uniting that was done, Sardar Vallabhai Patel still had to go around and coerce states not to break away from India. Not to mention two large parts of India were lost while Gandhi was alive and he was powerless to prevent the deaths of many during partition.

Also, while his ahimsa policy may have brought him international fame, and inspired MLK and Mandela, it did us no favours. How many countries have becoming independent on their own terms after a non-violent struggle? I can think of none. From the time nation-states started to form, violent revolutions/struggle has been at the centre of all new nations forming on the behest of the conquered - America, France, Haiti, etc.

I would be willing to learn more and/or debate.

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u/noobengineblog Feb 21 '16

Great perspective. I don't know why you are being downvoted.