মুজনাই সাপ্তাহিক 

বিশেষ সংখ্যা 

Title: A yogi who was read wrong in India?

Subtitle: Or was Gandhi actually a poverty-loving, spiritual figure out of the touch with practical world?

Author: Anghsuman Paul

Okay, so let’s start with a question. What comes to your mind when you hear the name ‘Gandhi’? With definite conviction, the answer would be a non-violent, poverty-loving, spiritual figure out of touch with the so-called hard-headed world or the answer can be also as a supporter of woolly backward ideas. There’s more! In the economic sphere, he’s often illustrated as an anti-industrial person and if you are a Bong (like this author), then you must have also heard he was anti-Bengali (read Subhash Chandra Bose). Instead of merely drawing a simplistic conclusion on the father of the nation, let’s try to see Gandhi’s certain philosophies, which otherwise have been overlooked. Like say for instance, his preaching of forgiveness has been criticized as cowardice but the fact is Gandhi believed one should be first powerful enough to punish and only then should practice forgiveness; forgiveness without any power has been actually coined by Gandhi as cowardice.

For we Indians, Gandhi still remain as imaginary person who’s ideal was to judge the moral basis of our actions and we could never understand his  personal austerity. Renowned author Pavan K Varma says, “We respect him for it but more as a person from earth may look up to the powers of someone from another planet.”  So is he an alien yogi who’s paid obeisance only on 2^nd of October? With definite conviction, Gandhi’s imperviousness to the temptations of the material world left us awed but unconverted and Indians admired his ability to restrict his wants but certainly were not prepared to emulate him.  No wonder his ashram in Ahmedabad remained a place of curiosity, not of inspiration.

Without concluding anything on whether Gandhi loved poverty or not; it can be said to him, wealth creation was the way out of the ‘grinding pauperism’ and he was looked up to as a Mahatma because in his denial & sacrifice of wealth, he was so different. Even conventional yogis, the saints & sadhus who proliferate in India today are porous to earthly munificence but Gandhi’s instrumental view of wealth derived directly from his love of the Isavasya Upanishad. And to understand that we Indians must read Gandhi’s work first rather than commenting on something based on the work of others written on this wrongly read yogi.