Preview

How Did Gandhi Contribute To Civil Disobedience?

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
531 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
How Did Gandhi Contribute To Civil Disobedience?
Mohandas Gandhi, born on October 2, 1869, led non-violent independence movements in India and South Africa. Gandhi was an advocate for the civil rights of Indians, and had a background in law. Among his many achievements were the organized boycotts against the British through methods of civil disobedience. Mohandas Gandhi was born in Porbandar, India, which at the time was part of the British Empire. As a child Gandhi hated school and rebelled, doing things such as smoking and stealing small amounts of money. Gandhi wanted to pursue a career as a doctor, however his father steered him on the path of a legal profession. By the year 1885, Gandhi was 16 and had a wife named Kasturba. Kasturba was soon pregnant with a child. However late in that year, Gandhi’s father passed away, and a few weeks later his child died soon after being born. Gandhi blamed himself for both of these tragedies and waited restlessly for the time when he could get away. In the year …show more content…
Upon his return, Gandhi was informed that his mother had just died weeks earlier. In India Gandhi struggled to find work as a lawyer, and when he did get his first case he froze up due to nerves and fled the courtroom. After struggling to find work in India, Gandhi decided to pursue legal services in South Africa. When he arrived, Gandhi was astounded with the discrimination and racism by the British there. A particularly influential moment in his life occurred a few days later on June 7, 1893. During his train ride to a city called Pretoria, a white man denied his presence in the first-class section of the train, even though Gandhi had a ticket. Gandhi refused to move to the back of the train and was thrown off the train at the station. “He vowed that night to ‘try, if possible, to root out the disease and suffer hardships in the process,” (biography.com). From that point on, Gandhi would grow to be a powerful force for civil

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    Mahatma Gandhi, who was born on October 2, 1869, in Porbandar, Kathiawar, India. Gandhi stayed in India until he decided to travel to England in 1888 to get his Law degree. In 1893 Gandhi traveled to South Africa to pursue a job as a barrister, where he experienced the extent of discrimination towards Indians in South Africa .Gandhi was traveling to the Transvaal province of South Africa by train where he was asked to move back to the third-class car even though he had a first class ticket. Gandhi refusing to make the change was thrown off the train. After being thrown off the train he had to make a decision whether to head back to India or stay and fight for the rights of Indians in South Africa. It was after witnessing the unfair treatment of Indians that…

    • 1055 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Gandhi Dbq Analysis

    • 548 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Mohandas Gandhi was a lawyer who practiced in colonial South Africa and eventually led a nonviolent revolution for Indian independence. Gandhi was taught from birth to value all life as holy and respect all religions. The British controlled India for 200 years and Gandhi resented the British influence on his country, and wanted people to live freely. Although Gandhi could have chosen other methods to achieve Indian independence, his nonviolent civil disobedience, willingness to be incarcerated, and not viewing Britain as an enemy, led to an India independent from British rule.…

    • 548 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Gandhi participated in a salt march, boycotts, home spinning his own clothing and he even partook in fasting for up to twenty-one days all for economic freedom from the British. He has influenced a number of people with his civil disobedience and persistence, for example Martin Luther King Jr, Nelson Mandela, Albert Einstein and our very own former…

    • 406 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Gandhi was the leader of the Indian Independence movement in British ruled India. He resisted the government by using non-violent disobedience. You must keep in mind that the system that he lived in(British ruled India) was very organized and it was very hard to resist the governments laws. He used one of the most effective methods of gathering the people and controlling them to his will. For example when the people made revolts against the British government Gandhi would starve himself to get them to listen because the people really cared about him. This method can only work if the people really care about you. At 5:17 PM on 30 January 1948 Gandhi was assassinated by Nathuram Godse in the garden of the Birla house. In 1930 Mahatma Gandhi challenged the British government by ignoring the salt tax with a 400 km Salt…

    • 958 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Mohandas Gandhi was born in 1869, in Porbandar, India. His father taught his son respect for all religions. His mother taught him that all living things are holy. Following custom, Gandhi married at age 13; his wife, Kasturbai, was even younger. At age 19 he went to London to study law, and at age 22 Gandhi completed his studies. He now felt more than ever that the English, who had ruled India for almost two centuries, were law-abiding and fair. Hopes high, he sailed for…

    • 1138 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Ghandi Eulogy

    • 311 Words
    • 1 Page

    Mohandas K. Ghandi was born in 1869 in India. Britain owned the land that he grew up on and his people were heavily taxed. He was married at the age of thirteen, and lost a son and his father some three years later. As he grew up the cruel treatment from the British supremacists continued. This treatment eventually gave Ghandi the idea to protest against things that appeared wrong to him.…

    • 311 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Gandhi Obituary

    • 873 Words
    • 4 Pages

    While in England, Mohandas came across new cultures, people, and ideas. Gandhi quickly received his law degree and was called to the bar in 1891, but returned to India later that year. After opening an unsuccessful law office, Mohandas Gandhi accepted an offer of an Indian businessman to be the man’s legal advisor, and moved to South Africa. During Gandhi’s twenty year stay in Africa, he began to see European racism and nationalism. Mohandas soon became the leader of the African-Indian community, and developed satayagraha to signify his non-violent practices.…

    • 873 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Mahatma Gandhi Imperialism

    • 1080 Words
    • 5 Pages

    He had demanded the release of the British rule over India. It was because of the discrepancies between India and the British that Gandhi decided to started the "Quit India Movement." It was through this that many people stood up to stop colonialism on India. Mahatma worked hard to enhance the status of the lower class people in society. He was a leader in trying for political independence(Hartman). His first campaign was called the satyagraha campaign. This campaign was built on the foundation of non-violent protest. The goal of this movement was to end a law requiring Indians living in Transvaal to get fingerprints. Their goal was met and Gandhi continued to push other protests and organizing resistances to his cause. After all of his works done in South Africa, he took what he had learned to India. There he continued to express his feeling toward the discrimination of his people. It wasn't too soon until his fight for Indian Independence had spread and people saw him as a hero(Mohandas). As you can see Gandhi worked as a very successful political leader doing anything in his power to do what was right. Gandhi, although claiming he was only an average man, had seemed to be more than that doing things people of little faith had doubted could be done. Gandhi makes these claims in his quote saying, "I claim to be no more than an average man with less than average abilities. I…

    • 1080 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    He is well known as the prominent leader of the Indian independence movement in British-ruled India. Gandhi got his start working in politics as a lawyer in South Africa. There, he supported the local Indian community’s struggle for civil rights. Gandhi carried his knowledge and passion for improving the lower classes to India.…

    • 780 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Originally a lawyer from India, Gandhi was appalled at the racial injustice he saw while in South Africa and was arrested for disobeying the law that all Indians had to register with the police. While in prison he read and was heavily influenced by Henry David Thoreau’s essay “Civil Disobedience”. He applied the principles he read in the essay to the issues within India such as British Imperialism, tensions between Hindus and Muslims, and class discrimination between Indians. He led strikes and protests throughout India to try to invoke change. Despite being arrested several times for his actions, Gandhi continued to take actions he believed to be necessary, and ultimately India did become independent.…

    • 785 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi[3] was born on 2 October 1869 in Porbandar, a coastal town which was then part of the Bombay Presidency, British India. His father, Karamchand Gandhi (1822–1885), who belonged to the Hindu Modh community, served as the diwan (a high official) of Porbander state, a small princely state in the Kathiawar Agency of British India.[4] His grandfather was Uttamchand Gandhi, fondly called Utta Gandhi. His mother, Putlibai, who came from the Hindu Pranami Vaishnava community, was Karamchand's fourth wife, the first three wives having apparently died in childbirth.[5] Growing up with a devout mother and the Jain traditions of the region, the young Mohandas absorbed early the influences that would play an important role in his adult life; these included compassion for sentient beings, vegetarianism, fasting for self-purification, and mutual tolerance among individuals of different creeds.[6]…

    • 812 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Essay of Mahatma Gandhi

    • 706 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Gandhi returned to India in early 1915, and never left the country. Over the next few years, he was to become involved in numerous local struggles, such as at Champaran in Bihar,…

    • 706 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Essay on Mahatma Gandhi

    • 1657 Words
    • 7 Pages

    After completing his studies he returned to India. He started his practice at Bombay. But he did not do well there. Then he went to Rajkot. He was not a successful lawyer because he did not like to plead false cases, but oneday he was called by a big Indian Merchant in South Africa to conduct a law suit in a court. He went to Africa. Gandhi remained in South Africa for twenty years, suffering imprisonment many times. In 1896, after being attacked and humiliated by white South Africans, Gandhi began to teach a policy of passive resistance to, and non-cooperation with, the South African authorities. Part of the inspiration for this policy came from the Russian writer Leo Tolstoy, whose influence on Gandhi was profound. Gandhi also acknowledged his debt to the teachings of Christ and to…

    • 1657 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Need Essay

    • 500 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Celebration of Gandhi Jayanti is also a moment to relive Mohandas Gandhi's life and contribution in India's Independence. Born in a small coastal town Porbandar in Gujarat, Gandhi married Kasturbai Makhanji at the age of 13. His childhood memories and experiences are vividly depicted by him in his autobiography My experiments with truth. Gandhi at the age of 18 went to England to study law and returned to India in 1915. After his homecoming, he led nationwide stir for achieving Sawaraj, abolition of social evils, empowering women rights and improving economic conditions of peasants and farmers. He further strengthened his movement against the British Raj and led Indians in protesting Dandi March Salt in 1930 that was later followed by the popular Quit India in 1942 calling British to leave India.…

    • 500 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Mahatma Gandhi

    • 548 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Born and raised in a Hindu, merchant caste, family in coastal Gujarat, western India, and trained in law at the Inner Temple, London, Gandhi first employed non-violent civil disobedience as an expatriate lawyer in South Africa, in the resident Indian community's struggle for civil rights. After his return to India in 1915, he set about organising peasants, farmers, and urban labourers to protest against excessive land-tax and discrimination. Assuming leadership of the Indian National Congress in 1921, Gandhi led nationwide campaigns for easing poverty, expanding women's rights, building religious and ethnic amity, ending untouchability, but above all for achieving Swaraj or self-rule.…

    • 548 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays