In 1996, the Government of India introduced the Mahatma Gandhi series of currency notes in rupees 5, 10, 20, 50, 100, 500 and 1000 denomination. Today, all the currency notes in circulation in India contain a portrait of Mahatma Gandhi. In 1969, the United Kingdom issued a series of stamps commemorating the centenary of Mahatma Gandhi.
There have been approximately 250 stamps issued bearing Gandhi's image from 80 different countries worldwide.[1]
2000: Gandhi is portrayed by Naseeruddin Shah in Hey Ram. A film made by Kamal Haasan, it portrays a would-be assassin of Gandhi and the dilemma faced by the would-be assassins in the turmoil of post-partition India.
2002: Gandhi is portrayed by Surendra Rajan in the film The Legend of Bhagat Singh, a historical biographical film about the Indian freedom fighter Bhagat Singh.
2004: Swades, "epitomizes Gandhi's values" according to his great-grandson, Tushar Gandhi.[3] The protagonist is called Mohan (Bhargava) which is Gandhi's birth name (Mohandas). The film is about a young NRI returning to India to help the country and its people, a tale similar to that of Gandhi's life.
2005: Gandhi is portrayed by Mohan Jhangiani (actor) and Zul Vilani (voice) who appears briefly in the film Water (the film was also turned into the book, Water: A Novel, by Bapsi Sidhwa).
2005: Maine Gandhi Ko Nahin Mara, tells the story of a retired Hindi professor, who, as he falls victim to dementia, begins to believe that he was accused of being the man who assassinated Mahatma Gandhi.
2009: Road to Sangam tells the story of a devout Muslimmechanic named Hasmat Ullah (Paresh Rawal) who has been entrusted the job of repairing an old V8 ford engine, not knowing the historic significance that it once carried Gandhi's ashes which were immersed in the holy Triveni Sangam.
2011: Koormavatara, a Kannada film by Girish Kasaravalli revolves around a government employee cast in a play to portray Mahatma Gandhi, who, on course, realizes that playing Gandhi is easier than imbibing and implementing his principles in real-life.[4] Scholar Dr. Shikaripura Krishnamurthy essayed the role of government employee.
2012: Welcome Back Gandhi (also known as Mudhalvar Mahatma), directed by A. Balakrishnan and starring S. Kanagaraj as Gandhi,[5] portrays the impact Gandhi would have if he returned to present day India.
2023: Deepak Antani portrayed Gandhi in Gandhi Godse – Ek Yudh, the film deals with a fictional situation in which Gandhi survives his assassination.[9]
"Soldier of the Queen" by Barbara Hambly in "War of the Worlds: Global Dispatches (1996), an alternate history and science fictionanthology set in an alternate universe where the Martian alien invasion of Earth depicted in "The War of the Worlds" (1898) by H. G. Wells actually happened in the year that the novel was published. As with the other stories in the anthology, it deals with celebrities of the time (in this case Gandhi and author Rudyard Kipling) and how they dealt with the Martian invasion of their locality. India was invaded but the Martians were defeated worldwide. The Martians also invaded Britain (which was what happened in the original H. G. Wells novel) and Gandhi takes advantage of the turmoil in Britain by declaring Indian independence 50 years early (in 1898 instead of 1948).
Memorials, paintings, sculptures, and statues
Mahatma Gandhi wax statue
There have been numerous memorials to Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi. In New Delhi, Gandhi Smriti, or Birla House, the home of Ghanshyam Das Birla, where Gandhi was assassinated on 30 January 1948, was acquired by the Government of India in 1971 and opened to the public in 1973 as the Gandhi Smriti or "Gandhi Remembrance". It preserves the room where Mahatma Gandhi lived the last four months of his life and the grounds where he was shot while holding his nightly public walk. A Martyr's Column now marks the place where Mohandas Gandhi was assassinated.
In 1988, India donated a bust of Gandhi to the city of Burgos, Spain, which is located in a park.[10] The city of Pietermaritzburg, South Africa—where Gandhi was ejected from a first-class train in 1893—now hosts a commemorative statue that was unveiled during the 2003 Cricket World Cup by the Indian team led by captain Saurav Ganguly. In the United Kingdom, there are several prominent statues of Gandhi, most notably two in London: one in Tavistock Square near University College London where he studied law, and another in Parliament Square. 30 January is commemorated in the United Kingdom as the "National Gandhi Remembrance Day."
Józef Gosławski designed a caricature of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi in 1932, which was cast in bronze in 2007.
Gandhi's Three Monkeys is a series of sculptures created by Indian artist Subodh Gupta. The sculptures recall a visual metaphor from Gandhi, of the "Three wise monkeys", representing the principle "see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil".[12]
In 2010, realist painter Gopal Swami Khetanchi depicted Gandhi's dream of an independent India in his exhibition titled Gandhigiri. The exhibition displayed twenty-one artworks depicting an elderly Gandhi with other elements and figures complementing or countering the discourse.[13][14][15][16][17]
Statue of M.K. Gandhi, Roma Street Parklands, Brisbane, 2024
In Australia, the Indian community of Brisbane commissioned a statue of Gandhi, created by Ram V. Sutar and Anil Sutar in the Roma Street Parkland. It was unveiled In 2014, by Narendra Modi, then Prime Minister of India.[18][19]
On 22 November 2018, President of India Ramnath Kovind unveiled a statue of Mahatma Gandhi in Parramatta, Sydney, Australia.[20][21]
In 2018, a statue of Gandhi at the University of Ghana, erected in 2016, was removed, "after protests from students and faculty who argue the Indian independence leader considered Africans 'inferior'.... Campaigners in Malawi are trying to stop another Gandhi statue from being erected in the capital Blantyre."[22]
In 2019, the fifth statue of Gandhi in the United Kingdom was unveiled at Manchester Cathedral. The statue weighing 800kg and measuring 9 feet was a gift from Shrimad Rajchandra Mission Dharampur, a worldwide spiritual organization. It was unveiled by the mayor of Manchester and Pujya Gurudevshri Rakeshbhai along with several guests as a symbol of peace and compassion, following the 2017 terror attack at Manchester Arena.[23][24][25]
2002-03: Gandhi Smith is a main character in the animated series Clone High; his depiction on the show was controversial and resulted in its cancellation after only one season. When the show was revived in 2023, Gandhi was excluded from the main cast, though was still referenced by other characters, suggesting a possible return in future seasons.
2004:"One World: Telecom Italia 'Gandhi' ": An award-winning television commercial produced by Y&R, Italy and directed by Spike Lee. It depicts Gandhi broadcasting a speech during World War II, reaching audiences through the use of digital technology.[30][31]
The 1995 Marathi play Gandhi Virudh Gandhi explored the relationship between Gandhi and his son Harilal. The 2007 film, Gandhi, My Father was inspired on the same theme. The 1997 Hindi play Gandhi Ambedkar criticised Gandhi and his principles.[33][34]
In the CivilizationTurn-based strategy series (1991–present), Gandhi appears as the leader of the Indian civilisation starting from the first game in the series Civilization (1996) and all other games in the series excluding spin-offs.
If the player is not playing as the Indian civilisation, the computer makes Gandhi act in much the same way as real life (i.e. peaceful)[40] and will not attack other civilisations unless attacked himself.[41] As part of the series, the technology tree in the games allow both the player's own civilisation and others controlled by the computer to discover nuclear energy and subsequently develop nuclear weapons.
From the first game in the series up to and including Civilization IV (2005), Gandhi does use the weapons during a war (which by his very nature is strictly a defensive war) but not any more than any other peaceful leader (such as Abraham Lincoln, leader of the American civilisation) although it was perceived.[40][41][42][43]
Starting from Civilization V (2010) onwards, a new feature by programmer Jon Shafer was added as a joke where once Gandhi gains nuclear weapons, he will bomb neighbouring civilisation and the player's own.[43] The joke was that Gandhi is famous for his strict adherence to the principle of non-violence and so it would be extremely uncharacteristic of Gandhi to start a war, especially a nuclear war, leading to internet memes about a so-called "Nuclear Gandhi".[43]
Over time, it became a popular misconception that a glitch in the first game and/or the second game, Civilization II (1996) turned Gandhi into a nuclear warmonger under such circumstances. Supposedly, the glitch was caused by an integer overflow error whereby Gandhi's aggression level was set to "1" (the lowest level) and if it lowered again, instead of the non-existent "0", it would instead lower to "255" (the highest level) and make Gandhi very aggressive.
In 2020, the first game's creator, Sid Meier stated that no such glitch was in the first Civilization and the game was not programmed in such a manner as the first game used the programing language C and the second game used C++. In both, those programing languages, all integer variables are signed by default making such a glitch impossible.[42][43]
↑ Pant, Garima (27 September 2010). "Gandhigiri framed". The Financial Express. Archived from the original on 19 August 2016. Retrieved 11 August 2016.
↑ Gupta, Gargi (2 October 2010). "Father figure". Business Standard. Archived from the original on 21 August 2016. Retrieved 11 August 2016.
↑ Sanyal, Amitava (25 September 2010). "In the name of the father". Hindustan Times. Archived from the original on 16 September 2016. Retrieved 11 August 2016.
↑ Kalra, Vandana (2 October 2010). "Mark of the Mahatma". The Indian Express. Archived from the original on 15 September 2016. Retrieved 11 August 2016.
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.
Nathuram Vinayak Godse was the assassin of Mahatma Gandhi. He was a Hindu nationalist from Maharashtra who shot Gandhi in the chest three times at point blank range at a multi-faith prayer meeting in Birla House in New Delhi on 30 January 1948.
Vinayak Damodar Savarkar was an Indian politician, activist and writer. Savarkar developed the Hindu nationalist political ideology of Hindutva while confined at Ratnagiri in 1922. He was a leading figure in the Hindu Mahasabha. The prefix "Veer" has been applied to his name by his followers.
Akhil Bharatiya Hindu Mahasabha is a Hindu nationalist political party in India.
Hey Ram is a 2000 Indian epic historical drama film written, directed, and produced by Kamal Haasan, that stars him and Shah Rukh Khan in lead roles. It was simultaneously made in the Tamil and Hindi languages.
Mahatma Gandhi was assassinated on 30 January 1948 at age 78 in the compound of The Birla House, a large mansion in central New Delhi. His assassin was Nathuram Godse, from Pune, Maharashtra, a Hindutva activist, a member of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), a right-wing Hindu paramilitary organization as well as a member of the Hindu Mahasabha.
The Making of the Mahatma is a 1996 biographical film directed by Shyam Benegal, about the early life of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi during his 21 years in South Africa. The film is based upon the book The Apprenticeship of a Mahatma by Fatima Meer. It was an international co-production between India and South Africa.
Nine Hours to Rama is 1963 British-American neo noir crime film directed by Mark Robson that follows a fictionalised Nathuram Godse in the hours before he assassinated the Indian independence leader, Gandhi, and police attempts to prevent the murder. It is based on a 1962 novel of the same name by Stanley Wolpert. The film was written by Nelson Gidding and filmed in England and India with mainly white actors in prominent roles. It stars Horst Buchholz, Diane Baker, Jose Ferrer, and Robert Morley. It was shot in CinemaScope DeLuxe Color.
Diwan Bahadur Rettamalai Srinivasan, commonly known as R. Srinivasan, was a scheduled caste activist and politician from then Madras Presidency of British India. He is a Paraiyar icon and was a close associate of Mahatma Gandhi and was also an associate of B. R. Ambedkar. He is remembered today as one of the pioneers of the Scheduled caste movement in India. He founded the Adi dravida mahajana sabha in 1893.
Rakesh Jhaveri, also known as Pujya Gurudevshri Rakeshji, is a spiritual leader, mystic, scholar of Jainism, author and orator from India. Spiritually inclined from a young age, he is a follower of Shrimad Rajchandra, a Jain spiritual teacher. He completed doctoral studies on Shrimad's work Atmasiddhi. He founded Shrimad Rajchandra Mission, Dharampur which supports spiritual and social activities.
Dinanath Gopal Tendulkar (1909–1972) was an Indian writer and documentary film maker. He is most well known as the author of an eight-volume biography of Mahatma Gandhi, titled Mahatma: Life of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi. He was also a close associate of Vithalbhai Jhaveri and collaborated for the documentary film, Mahatma: Life of Gandhi, 1869–1948. He died on Monday, June 12, 1972.
Ram Vanji Sutar is an Indian sculptor. He designed the Statue of Unity which is the world's tallest statue with a height of 182 metres, exceeding the Spring Temple Buddha by 54 metres.
Me Nathuram Godse Boltoy is a two-act play written in the Marathi language. It has been written by Pradeep Dalvi. It is based on the book May It Please You Honour written by Gopal Godse. According to Karline McLain the play enacts Godse's defense plea and thus explores the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi and the trial of Godse from Godse's point of view.
Veer Savarkar is a 2001 Indian Hindi-language biopic film based on the life of Indian Freedom fighter, social reformer and politician Vinayak Damodar Savarkar. This version was released on DVD format. This film is produced by Savarkar Darshan Prathisthan, under the president-ship of Sudhir Phadke. It was premiered on 16 November 2001, in Mumbai, New Delhi, Nagpur and six other Indian cities. On 28 May 2012 its Gujarati language version was released by then Chief Minister of Gujarat, Narendra Modi.
Sare Jahan se Accha is a pencil sketch mural in Ahmednagar city in Maharashtra, India. It was created in the year 1997. The sketch was drawn by Pramod Kamble, who is a painter and sculptor. He created it as a tribute to the nation on the occasion of 50 years of independence. It was painted on the specially-prepared wall of Mahavir Art Gallery in Ahmednagar. Kamble has portrayed Bharat Mata and 500 great people born out of Indian culture. It is said to be the world's biggest pencil sketch. This is the only fixed asset in India which was made as a part of India's 50th Independence day celebration.
Vithalbhai Jhaveri (1916–1985) was an Indian independence activist, filmmaker, photographer, writer and a close associate of Mahatma Gandhi. He documented Gandhi, since the Dandi March till his death in 1948, through numerous photographs which were displayed at many exhibitions and used in several literary works. Gandhi-A Photo Biography, a book by Peter Rühe, uses several of his photographs and he was a collaborator of Dinanath Gopal Tendulkar, in the latter's biography of Mahatma Gandhi, Mahatma; Life of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi. His 330-minute documentary on Gandhi, Mahatma: Life of Gandhi, 1869–1948, covers the Indian leader's life through 14 chapters. The Government of India awarded him the third highest civilian honour of the Padma Bhushan, in 1969, for his contributions to Literature and education.
Herbert Fischer (1914–2006) was a German diplomat, indologist and the ambassador of the erstwhile German Democratic Republic to India from 1972 to 1976. Fischer was born on 10 April 1914 in Herrnhut, in East Germany to a craftsman. He migrated to western Europe in 1933, where he completed his studies. Fischer moved to India in 1936, which gave him the opportunity to get acquainted with Mahatma Gandhi. After Indian independence in 1947, he returned to the German Democratic Republic, where he joined the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 1956. He served as the Chief of the East German Trade Mission in the late 1960s, before becoming the East German ambassador to India in 1972. He was the author of many Indological books, including Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, a biography of the Indian leader. He was a recipient of the Patriotic Order of Merit III Class. In 2003, the Government of India awarded him the Padma Bhushan, their third highest civilian honour, for his contributions to public affairs.
The Gandhi family is the family of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, commonly known as Mahatma Gandhi; Mahatma meaning "high souled" or "venerable" in Sanskrit; the particular term 'Mahatma' was accorded Mohandas Gandhi for the first time while he was still in South Africa, and not commonly heard as titular for any other civil figure even of similarly rarefied stature or living or posthumous presence.
Mohandas is an Indian biographical film about the childhood of Mahatma Gandhi. It is written and directed by nine-time National Film Award winner P. Sheshadri and was made in three languages simultaneously, English, Hindi and Kannada.
Gandhi Godse – Ek Yudh is a 2023 Indian-Hindi language history film written and directed by Rajkumar Santoshi, and produced by Manila Santoshi. The film stars Deepak Antani and Chinmay Mandlekar in the lead roles. The film deals with a fictional situation in which Mahatma Gandhi survives his assassination and thereafter decides to not only pardon Nathuram Godse, but also socialize with him.
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