World History

India Essay

Evaluate the role and influence of Gandhi in the development of Indian nationalism in the period up to 1945

According to Nelson Mandela, “Gandhi was no ordinary leader”. With his strategies of non-cooperation, non-violent resistance and the idea that a country and a culture can only be dominated if its citizens cooperated with its dominators, he not only contributed to the development of Indian nationalism but also inspired anti-colonial and antiracist movements across the world.

Mohandas Gandhi was born in 1869. He studied law at a London university and after being accepted to the British bar in 1891 he returned to India to establish a law practice in Bombay. Two years later at the age of 23 Gandhi arrived in South Africa to work for an Indian law firm. Here he was faced instantly with raw discrimination. Even as he traveled to Johannesburg in a first class train compartment he was ordered to move to the ‘coloured’ cars in the rear. Even though his first reaction was to flee, he decided to stay instead to redeem the dignity of the racially exploited. By the time he left South Africa 21 years later he had paved the way for the liberation of the colonised and the socially suppressed.

What Gandhi achieved in South Africa was merely practice in regards to his main aim of Indian independence. On his return Gandhi began to advocate Satyagraha as he lunched the passive resistance against British rule especially after the introduction of the Rowlatt acts in 1919, which gave the colonial authorities the power to deal with revolutionary activities without a trial. Satyagraha spread through India and gained millions of followers. It would be Gandhi’s first campaign against British rule in India. Unfortunately, when a crowd of Anti-British gathered at Amritsar it resulted in the massacre of 379 Indians as General Dyer ordered his troops to fire into the unarmed crowd. Dyer’s lack of remorse was interpreted by the Indians as a display of arrogant...