Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was an Indian lawyer, anti-colonial nationalist, and political ethicist who employed nonviolent resistance to lead the successful campaign for India's independence from British rule. He inspired movements for civil rights and freedom across the world. The honorific Mahātmā, first applied to him in South Africa in 1914, is now used throughout the world.
Sarvōdaya is a Sanskrit term which generally means "universal uplift" or "progress of all". The term was used by Mahatma Gandhi as the title of his 1908 translation of John Ruskin's critique of political economy, Unto This Last, and Gandhi came to use the term for the ideal of his own political philosophy. Later Gandhians, like the Indian nonviolence activist Vinoba Bhave, embraced the term as a name for the social movement in post-independence India which strove to ensure that self-determination and equality reached all strata of Indian society. Samantabhadra, an illustrious Digambara monk, as early as the 2nd century A.D., called the tīrtha of Mahāvīra by the name sarvodaya.
Rajmohan Gandhi is an Indian biographer, historian, politician and research professor at the Center for South Asian and Middle Eastern Studies, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, US. His paternal grandfather is Mahatma Gandhi, and his maternal grandfather is Chakravarthi Rajagopalachari. He is also a scholar in residence at the Indian Institute of Technology Gandhinagar.
The Swadeshi movement was a self-sufficiency movement that was part of the Indian independence movement and contributed to the development of Indian nationalism. Before the BML Government's decision for the partition of Bengal was made public in December 1903, there was a lot of growing discontentment among the Indians. In response the Swadeshi movement was formally started from Town Hall at Calcutta on 7 August 1905 to curb foreign goods by relying on domestic production. Mahatma Gandhi described it as the soul of swaraj (self-rule). The movement took its vast size and shape after rich Indians donated money and land dedicated to Khadi and Gramodyog societies which started cloth production in every household. It also included other village industries so as to make village self-sufficient and self-reliant. The Indian National Congress used this movement as arsenal for its freedom struggle and ultimately on 15 August 1947, a hand-spun Khadi tricolor Ashoka Chakra Indian flag was unfurled at Princess Park near India Gate, New Delhi by Jawaharlal Nehru.
Swarāj can mean generally self-governance or "self-rule". The term was used synonymously with "home-rule" by Maharishi Dayanand Saraswati and later on by Mahatma Gandhi, but the word usually refers to Gandhi's concept of Indian independence from foreign domination. Swaraj lays stress on governance, not by a hierarchical government, but by self-governance through individuals and community building. The focus is on political decentralisation. Since this is against the political and social systems followed by Britain, Gandhi's concept of Swaraj advocated India's discarding British political, economic, bureaucratic, legal, military, and educational institutions. S. Satyamurti, Chittaranjan Das and Motilal Nehru were among a contrasting group of Swarajists who laid the foundation for parliamentary democracy in India.
Gandhism is a body of ideas that describes the inspiration, vision, and the life work of Mohandas K. Gandhi. It is particularly associated with his contributions to the idea of nonviolent resistance, sometimes also called civil resistance.
Narhari Dwarkadas Parikh was a writer, independence activist and social reformer from Gujarat, India. Influenced by Mahatma Gandhi, he was associated with Gandhian institutes throughout his life. He wrote biographies, edited works by associates and translated some works. His writing also reflected Gandhian influence.
Sushila Nayyar, also spelt 'Nayar', was an Indian physician, a lifelong follower of Mahatma Gandhi, and a politician. She played a leading role in public health, medical education and social and rural reconstruction in India. She became Gandhi's personal physician and an important member of his inner circle. Later, she wrote several books based on her experiences. Her brother, Pyarelal Nayyar, was the personal secretary to Gandhi. In post-Independent India, she contested elections for political office and served as India's health minister.
The Gandhi cap is a white sidecap, pointed in front and back and having a wide band. It is made out of khadi. It takes its name after the Indian leader Mahatma Gandhi, who created it and first popularised its use during the Indian independence movement.
Gandhian economics is a school of economic thought based on the spiritual and socio-economic principles expounded by Indian leader Mahatma Gandhi. It is largely characterised by rejection of the concept of the human being as a rational actor always seeking to maximize material self-interest that underlies classical economic thinking. Where Western economic systems were based on what he called the "multiplication of wants," Gandhi felt that this was both unsustainable and devastating to the human spirit. His model, by contrast, aimed at the fulfillment of needs – including the need for meaning and community. As a school of economics the resulting model contained elements of protectionism, nationalism, adherence to the principles and objectives of nonviolence and a rejection of class war in favor of socio-economic harmony. Gandhi's economic ideas also aim to promote spiritual development and harmony with a rejection of materialism. The term "Gandhian economics" was coined by J. C. Kumarappa, a close supporter of Gandhi.
J. C. Kumarappa was an Indian economist and a close associate of Mahatma Gandhi. A pioneer of rural economic development theories, Kumarappa is credited for developing economic theories based on Gandhism – a school of economic thought he coined "Gandhian economics."
The Aundh Experiment was an early test of village-level self-government in British India which began in 1938 in Aundh State in present-day Maharashtra. Mohandas Gandhi, and Maurice Frydman helped to draft the November Declaration, which handed over rule of Aundh State from the Raja to the residents, and became law in the Swaraj Constitution of Aundh in 1939. The Aundh Experiment was an unusual idea in pre-independence India, where the rulers of princely states were loath to hand over their power.
Ramjee Singh is a former Member of Parliament and vice-chancellor of Jain Vishva Bharati University. He is an eminent Gandhian and is the author of a number of books on him. He was also the director of Gandhian Institute of Studies, Varanasi, India. In January 2020 he was awarded the fourth highest civilian award in the country: The Padma Shri for Social Work. His life has been a blend of being a Gandhian academician as well as an activist. Singh has declared Mahatma Gandhi as the Bodhisattva of the 20th century.
Yogendra Yadav is an Indian activist, psephologist and politician whose primary interests are in the political and social sciences. He was a Senior Fellow at the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS), Delhi from 2004 to 2016. He is a former member of University Grants Commission (UGC) and National Advisory Council on the Right to Education Act (NAC-RTE) constituted by Ministry of Human Resources and Development, Govt of India, in 2010. He was a member of the National Executive of the Aam Aadmi Party until 2015.
The Aam Aadmi Party is a political party in India. It was founded on 26 November 2012 by Arvind Kejriwal and his then-companions, following the 2011 Indian anti-corruption movement against then Indian government of Indian National Congress. The AAP is currently the governing party in the Indian state of Punjab and the union territory of Delhi. On 10 April 2023, the AAP was officially granted the status of national party by the ECI. The party's election symbol is a broom. The party is currently part of the coalition I.N.D.I.A.
S. P. Varma is a social worker and peace activist from Jammu and Kashmir. He has been actively involved in peace-building efforts in conflict-ridden areas of the Kashmir valley.
The Panchayat raj is a political system originating from the Indian subcontinent, primarily found in India and neighboring countries Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and Nepal. It is one of the oldest systems of local government in the Indian subcontinent, with historical mentions dating back to around 250 CE. The word 'raj' means 'rule,' and panchayat' means 'assembly' (ayat) of 'five' (panch). Traditionally, panchayats consisted of wise and respected elders chosen and accepted by the local community. These assemblies resolved disputes between individuals and villages. However, there were various forms of such assemblies.
Natwar Thakkar, popularly known as Natwar Bhai, was an Indian social worker who worked in Nagaland. He came from Maharashtra but migrated to Nagaland for social work at the age of 23. He founded the Nagaland Gandhi Ashram at Chuchuyimlang village in the Mokokchung district of Nagaland. Because of his efforts to spread Gandhian philosophy in Nagaland and his social work, he was known as "Nagaland's Gandhi".
Smart Village is a concept adopted by national, state and local governments of India, as an initiative focused on holistic rural development, derived from Mahatma Gandhi's vision of Adarsh Gram and Swaraj. Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched Sansad Adarsh Gram Yojana (SAGY) or SAANJHI) on 2 October 2014, Gandhi's birthday, in addition to Smart Cities and Digital India, as a development programme for India. The Parliamentarian's Model Village Scheme main goal is for each Member of Parliament and Minister to adopt a rural village and develop it into a model by 2019 under the SAGY guidelines. The vision of SAGY is an integrated village development plan, encompassing Personal, Human, Social, and Economic dimensions.
The followers of Mahatma Gandhi, the most prominent figure of the Indian independence movement, are called Gandhians.
