Making sense of the Gandhian politics in ‘contemporary India’ demands at least three steps of inquiry and interrogation: (i) Contextualizing Gandhi and his politics; (ii) Underlining the diversities within the followers of Gandhi in the early post-Gandhi period (1948 – 1979); and (iii) An overview of the Gandhian politics today in the era of globalization and majoritarianism.
1. Contextualizing Gandhi and his politics
Gandhi was committed for an ethical life and society based upon twin ideals – truth and non-violence. He endeavoured for Swaraj (decolonization), Swadeshi (indigenous development) and Sarvoday (well-being of all through participatory democracy). His methodology was a judicious combination of character-building, constructive program, non-cooperation and ‘Satyagraha’. He was not fascinated by politics as pursuit of power.
The emergence of Gandhi as a new kind of practitioner of politics based upon ‘soul-force’ or Satyagraha took place in Transvaal (South Africa) on September 11, 1906. His fascinating life journey was put to an end by an assassin on 30th January, 1948 at New Delhi (India) soon after India achieved freedom from foreign rule after continuously struggling for it between 1917 (Champaran Satyagraha) and 1946 (‘Quit India’ movement) under his leadership. Gandhi was inspired in different ways by the Indian Jain philosopher Shrimad Rajchandra (1867-1901), Russian visionary Leo Tolstoy (1828-1910), American naturalist Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862), and British thinker John Ruskin (1819-1900). He was an ever-evolving politician but he has presented his core values and ideas in ‘Hind Swaraj’ (1909) which is considered as ‘a Manifesto for the 21st Century’.
Gandhi was not a popular politician in ideological terms as he was continuously criticised by his contemporary Hindu and Muslim nationalists; Orthodox priests and the Dalit leaders; Rajas and radicals; capitalists and communists; liberals and militants. But his appeal kept growing and has continued to create new waves in most parts of the modern world system since his assassination. The Sarvodaya movement in India led by Vinoba and JP in India, Civil Rights Movement in the US led by Martin Luther King Jr., anti-apartheid movement led by Nelson Mandela in South Africa, anti-authoritarian movement in Pakistan led by Khan Abdul Gaffar Khan, the Green Movement in European Union, and the Tibetan resistance led by the Dalai Lama, and the peace and justice movements in Latin America are some of the outstanding examples of it. It is not insignificant that the United Nations has started celebrating 2nd October, the birth day of Gandhi, as International Day of non-violence since 2007.
2. Major diversities in the early post-Gandhi decades
There were three visible trends among the followers of the Gandhian way in the early decades of the post-Gandhi era. A non-confirmist Gandhian socialist Dr. Lohia called them (a) governmental Gandhians (“Sarakari’) (led by Nehru, Patel, Rajendra Prasad and other government leaders); (b) institutional Gandhians (‘Mathi’) (constructive work centres inspired by Vinoba Bhave); and (c) out-caste Gandhians (‘Kujaat’) (represented by opposition party politicians like Sane Guruji, Kripalani, and Lohia).
It got replaced by a new bi-polar formation in the 1970s – (i) pro-peoples’ movement Gandhians; and (ii) anti-protest movement Sarvodaya activists. The pro-movement Gandhians supported Jaiprakash Narayan’s initiatives against growing corruption in public life. He gave a call for ‘Total Revolution’. It was preceded by Nav-Nirman Movement in Gujarat which was supported by governmental Gandhians like former deputy prime minister Morarji Desai. They, including JP and Desai, were jailed in a large number during the Emergency Raj (June 1975 – March 1977). Later, they openly campaigned and cooperated with the opposition parties for ‘defeat of dictatorship and restoration of democracy’. This period also saw popularisation of a new synthesis called ‘Gandhian socialism’.
The ‘anti-protest movement Gandhians’ considered it as drifting away from ‘spiritualization’ and promoting ‘politicisation’ of the Gandhian legacy. They cooperated with the Communist Party in organizing ‘anti-Fascist conferences’. They supported the ruling Congress Party and its authoritarian rule. They tried to engineer a split in the Gandhian community of activists.
The turbulent 1970s promoted recruitment of youth in the Gandhian movement through new formations like Chhatra Yuwa Sangharsh Vahini. There were new initiatives by women for protecting forests (‘Chipko Andolan’), saving rivers (Narmada Bachao Andolan) and opposing the liquor Mafia. There was enlargement of activities of the Gandhians in the realm of civil liberties and democratic rights by establishing citizen forums like Citizens for Democracy (CFD) and Peoples’ Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL).
3. Era of ‘Paradigm shift’ and the Gandhian responses
India moved towards market mediated path of economic reforms in a decisive way since 1992. This is recognized as ‘paradigm shift’ from welfare state to liberalization-privatization-globalization. It caused rolling back of the newly evolved democratic state and creating spaces for market and commercialization. It was not surprising that it was opposed by the Gandhians on several fronts – village industries, ecological destruction, consumerism, and corruption.
It was a new turn in the followers of the Gandhian way. They joined hands with local communities against entry of global corporations in rural and tribal areas. National Alliance of Peoples Movements (NAPM) and World Social Forum were two major platforms which created new alliances between the Gandhians and the local community groups, trade unions and farmers’ unions. They criticised the policies of paradigm shift as there was total moving away from the Gandhian goals of Swadeshi (indigenous) and Swavalamban (self reliance). There protests were not ignorable. As a result a number of new entitlements were introduced between 2004 and 2014 including rural employment guarantee, forests’ rights, right to education, and right to information.
Gandhian politics has gone further towards protest politics since change of regime at the centre in 2014. They were critical about the economic orientation of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) led by Indian National Congress which was in power most of the time between 1992 and 2014, except two intervals between 1989-’91 and 1999-2004. But many of them considered the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) regime as not only promoter of anti-people economic agenda but also communal (anti-minorities) and majoritarian (Hindutva). It has brought most of them closer to the non-NDA political formations and civil society initiatives.
Today, (a) the civil liberties, (b) respect for all religions, (c) electoral reforms, (d) communal violence, (e) environmental crisis, (f) agricultural crisis, and (g) corruption at high places, have become priority issues in the agenda of the Gandhian activists. On the other hand, the NDA regime has not been indifferent to the Gandhian resistance as it has tried its own interpretation of the Gandhian legacy and the Gandhian icons, particularly Sardar Patel. There is a new discourse of nationalism with Savarkar as the ‘real’ hero and his concepts of ‘Hindutva’ and ‘Hindu Rashtra’ as the two key ideas of the Indian identity. It has also wrested control of the Gandhian institutions, including the Sabarmati Ashram and Gandhi Smriti and Darshan Samiti. It has encouraged rift in Sarva Sewa Sangh and forced a number of funding agencies to stop supporting various nongovernmental organisations, including the Gandhian voluntary organizations. Many observers suggest that it is an unprecedented challenge for the Gandhians where their world-view, icons, agenda of nation-building, institutional set-up and campaigns and programs are being challenged from all sides by a Hindu-centric political force. Such existential crisis was not there during the British Raj. It did not happen in the Emergency Raj. It will be interesting to see ‘what next’!
(Anand Kumar is an eminent socialist activist who retired as professor of sociology from Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi.)
