I asked myself,” Do I know about Gandhi??”
Unfortunately, I don’t know much about him. All that I knew was from my history text books giving a vivid picture of his contribution to the Indian Independence (much appreciated) but a rarely any reference is made to the man’s personal life itself. I did not know what Gandhi was as a normal man, only the projected Mahatma image.
Inquisitive and cynical in nature I actually searched for Gandhi in wikipedia and what a shock I was to receive. The content in wikipedia was exhaustive and by habit I skipped to the contents of the article and found part which refers to Gandhi’s bramacharya…DING..he was married and had 4 chidren…!! Curious, I continued to read on….
Apparently when he was having sex with his wife his father died, giving him a deep sense of guilt and became a vowed celibate deeply influenced by the philosophy of Brahmacharya.
“For Gandhi, Brahmacharya meant "control of the senses in thought, word and deed."”
Reading on was even more shocking to me……
Towards the end of his life, it became public knowledge that Gandhi had been sharing his bed for a number of years with young women.[38][39] He explained that he did this for bodily warmth at night and termed his actions as "nature cure". Later in his life he started experimenting with Brahmacharya in order to test his self control. His letter to Birla in April, 1945 referring to ‘women or girls who have been naked with me’ indicates that several women were part of his experiments.[40] Sex became the most talked about subject matter by Gandhi after ahimsa (non-violence) and increasingly so in his later years. He devoted five full editorials in Harijan discussing the practice of Brahmacharya.[41]
As part of these experiments, he initially slept with his women associates in the same room but at a distance. Afterwards he started to lie in the same bed with his women disciples and later took to sleeping naked alongside them.[40] According to Gandhi active-celibacy meant perfect self control in the presence of opposite sex. Gandhi conducted his experiments with a number of women such as Abha, the sixteen-year-old wife of his grandnephew Kanu Gandhi. Gandhi acknowledged “that this experiment is very dangerous indeed”, but thought “that it was capable of yielding great results”.[42] His nineteen-year-old grandniece, Manu Gandhi, too was part of his experiments. Gandhi had earlier written to her father, Jaisukhlal Gandhi, that Manu had started to share his bed so that he may "correct her sleeping posture".[42] In Gandhi’s view, the experiment of sleeping naked with Manu in Noakhali would help him in contemplating upon Hindu-Muslim unity in
Gandhi called Sarladevi, a married woman with children and a devout follower, his “spiritual wife”. He later said that he had come close to having sexual relations with her.[43] He had told a correspondent in March, 1945 that “sleeping together came with my taking up of bramhacharya or even before that”; he said he had experimented with his wife “but that was not enough”.[42] Gandhi felt satisfied with his experime
nts and wrote to Manu that “I have successfully practiced the eleven vows taken by me. This is the culmination of my striving for last thirty six years. In this yajna I got a glimpse of the ideal truth and purity for which I have been striving”.
I am not making any judgment on Gandhi based on this. I am still in the process verifying the claims made in this article. I let you guys decide upon how much you know about our Father of the nation. I felt like an ignorant ass after coming to know about all this from wikipedia and not our history teachers.
Was surprised, shocked, ashamed at myself for coming to know about this after my education is over.
More to come on this, the unknown about Gandhi, you know any references send them across.
Personally... How does that smile look now? Sweet and innocent or otherwise...? i would really like to know..
12 comments:
err? education over?? REALLY??!!!
besides, what we forget is that Gandhi was a mere mortal just like the rest of us and he can do whatever the hell he likes. even if it is practicing this weird Brahmacharya. there are countless number of anonymous men out there who do all sorts of weird things and die without a mention.
Why Gandhi's personal life should be given so much thought and prominence is well, debatable!
Formal education is atleast on a pause now..
Agreed, that there are numerous other people who do such weird 'experiments',the microscope is over Gandhi because he is not a mortal as you say, but immortalized when Tagore addressed him as Mahatma, it's because he is a cult figure-the scrutiny,its because people look up to him as a role model-the prodding into his personal life.
Don't you agree?
And this particular phrase had me dumbfounded.
In Gandhi’s view, the experiment of sleeping naked with Manu in Noakhali would help him in contemplating upon Hindu-Muslim unity in India before partition and ease communal tensions
i agree. but what i am tempted to question is this very "immortalization" of Gandhi. in what sense has he been immortalized? could we have done a better job of it?
Exactly, though i would like to differ, being a cynic...i'd ask
"Should we have actually immortalized him?"
Agree?
We as Indians have always overlooked the clay feet of our idols. Note the current brouhaha over the auction of his glasses and other artifacts.
Similarly for NTR,MGR,the great Gandhi-Nehru dynasty and so on.
I don't think the personal life of a public figure should figure-we should see their larger contributions to society. Henry Ford was an avowed anti-Semite, however we remember him more for inventing the assembly line and making the first affordable car for the masses.
At the same time- we shouldn't take their words or teachings as gospel and continue to propagate them long after they've ceased to be relevant.
(Gandhi's whole swadeshi and going back to the villages is an example here)
such arguments about the arcane lives of great people is always there.... serious stuff apart, i really loved the portrait of the mahan atma .... boy, you added a whole new perspective to his smile.... too good....
the very title which you have chosen is still a contradictory one.... I read somewhere in Gopal Godse's After-Jail-Time Interview, that Gandhi never uttered such words as "Hey Ram". And Gopal & Nathuram were just few feet away from him when he was shotted.
@srmash: the Hey Ram title was for the kick in the post and i do not deliberate on the issue of his last words, my post is a simple third person point of view of a issue , putting the details available on the internet on your plate to decide..
@ Rex : I bet you will argue with Henry Ford if he "preaches" Ford's engine is the best on the Formula 1 Track ( Not sure if they have one already - but for argument sake), here we all remember and revere gandhi for his teachings so its justifiable to dissect/deliberate his views on his grounds
@venkatesh: :D Dude i would never say gandhi's life was "arcane" he did stuff we could never fanthom..so lets give him that credit..
and yeah its been a while since i blogged..so apologies for the late reply, i'd be surprised if anyone actually retorts..
Your blog keeps getting better and better! Your older articles are not as good as newer ones you have a lot more creativity and originality now keep it up!
Very interesting post.. I'm sure it got a lot of readers thinking.. Keep up the good work..!
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