14
78 Global Journal of English Language and Literature April 2013. Volume 1. Issue 2. ISSN 2320-4397 Website: https://sites.google.com/site/globaljournalofell/ Gandhi: A Phenomenon of Emotional and Moral Intelligence Jayshree Singh Abstract This paper focuses on Gandhi’s emotional strength and his individual visionary perspective that was not formed through any training, through any associations with religious minded people or through particular teachings. Secondly paper aims to investigate his individual enterprise and efforts, that were for the sake of existence of all and that is the real source of all civilization and progress, he meant. Thirdly the study examines how these determinants guided the national politics of freedom i.e. external sovereignty of the country and its inhabitants. Fourthly the research paper would highlight how Gandhi’s sense of the social responsibility and social relationship connects its authenticity with inter-personal and emotional sensibility. About the Author(s):Dr. Jayshree Singh is Senior Faculty and Head of the Department of English at Bhupal Nobles P. G. College, Udaipur, India. E-mail: [email protected]/[email protected] andhi was neither “a behavioralist who takes only a mechanical view of man being motivated by selfish interests or ignore human values and norms nor he was a traditionalist who acts as idle spectators, novel-gazers and essayists” (Cherniss 2000). His principles of dharma, ahimsa, karam yogi, swaraj, satyagraha, bramacharya, satya, nishkama karma, sarvodaya, swadeshi and non-cooperation were the ways of passive resistance and the ingredient variables of his internal sovereignty. His internal self exercised authority over all associations, although he was not personally associated to any one because of being a karmayogi. The society as a whole in context of its cross-section connections lays emphasis on emotional intelligence which is described as “the aggregate or global capacity of the individual to act purposefully, to think rationally, and to deal effectively with environment”(Wechsler 1958: 21). By the contemporary critics the emotional intelligence is non-intellective’ (Wechsler 1958), that means it includes positive outlook, compassion, goodwill and extending support, perceiving other’s emotions and praising others and understanding them in order to have organizational productivity and individual performance. He was impersonal and intrapersonal in his relations not only throughout India but also globally by gaining strength from personal self-evaluation, by approaching to the pros and cons of the actions and reactions, by undergoing through ordeals, trials, hardships of adversity just like ordinary beings, by submitting his self, his body, his mind and his senses to G

Gandhi paper in gjell

Embed Size (px)

DESCRIPTION

This paper focuses on Gandhi’s emotional strength and his individual visionary perspective that was not formed through any training, through any associations with religious minded people or through particular teachings.

Citation preview

Page 1: Gandhi paper in gjell

78

Global Journal of English Language and Literature April 2013. Volume 1. Issue 2. ISSN 2320-4397 Website: https://sites.google.com/site/globaljournalofell/

Gandhi: A Phenomenon of Emotional and Moral Intelligence

Jayshree Singh

Abstract

This paper focuses on Gandhi’s emotional strength and his individual visionary perspective that was

not formed through any training, through any associations with religious minded people or through

particular teachings. Secondly paper aims to investigate his individual enterprise and efforts, that were

for the sake of existence of all and that is the real source of all civilization and progress, he meant.

Thirdly the study examines how these determinants guided the national politics of freedom i.e.

external sovereignty of the country and its inhabitants. Fourthly the research paper would highlight

how Gandhi’s sense of the social responsibility and social relationship connects its authenticity with

inter-personal and emotional sensibility.

About the Author(s):Dr. Jayshree Singh is Senior Faculty and Head of the Department of English at Bhupal Nobles P. G. College, Udaipur, India. E-mail: [email protected]/[email protected]

andhi was neither “a behavioralist who takes only a mechanical view of man being

motivated by selfish interests or ignore human values and norms nor he was a

traditionalist who acts as idle spectators, novel-gazers and essayists” (Cherniss

2000). His principles of dharma, ahimsa, karam yogi, swaraj, satyagraha, bramacharya,

satya, nishkama karma, sarvodaya, swadeshi and non-cooperation were the ways of passive

resistance and the ingredient variables of his internal sovereignty. His internal self exercised

authority over all associations, although he was not personally associated to any one because

of being a karmayogi. The society as a whole in context of its cross-section connections lays

emphasis on emotional intelligence which is described as “the aggregate or global capacity of

the individual to act purposefully, to think rationally, and to deal effectively with

environment”(Wechsler 1958: 21). By the contemporary critics the emotional intelligence is

‘non-intellective’ (Wechsler 1958), that means it includes positive outlook, compassion,

goodwill and extending support, perceiving other’s emotions and praising others and

understanding them in order to have organizational productivity and individual performance.

He was impersonal and intrapersonal in his relations not only throughout India but also

globally by gaining strength from personal self-evaluation, by approaching to the pros and

cons of the actions and reactions, by undergoing through ordeals, trials, hardships of

adversity just like ordinary beings, by submitting his self, his body, his mind and his senses to

G

Page 2: Gandhi paper in gjell

79

Global Journal of English Language and Literature April 2013. Volume 1. Issue 2. ISSN 2320-4397 Website: https://sites.google.com/site/globaljournalofell/

the cause that can bring universal consciousness, self-emancipation and that can make him

‘human and humane’(Gandhi 2008).

Gandhi’s writings in context of this secular modern civilization based on science and its

developments do suggest and manifest that until the world is pestered with ‘Thou shalts’ and

‘Thou shall nots’, there will be no compassion, no bliss, no humanity. For him all the

industrial developments, expansions, authority, hegemony convey the offshoots of emotional

intelligence which is surmounted by inner desires; likes and dislikes; aptitude and attitude.

One of the incidents of his childhood leaves an impression on the reader’s mind when

he writes about his school days memories – he was called ‘stupid’ by his mates and by the

teachers, for he could not understand the fact that his presentation of misspelt word ‘kettle’

would spoil the inspection report of his school due to him. His stupidity of not ‘copying’ the

correct answer arouse a good amount of debate in school and at home but Mohandas Gandhi

did not get confused nor he lost any respect for his teacher, because he ‘was, by nature, blind

to the faults of the elders’( My Experiments with Truth,6; all subsequent references will be

termed as MEWT,)

Gandhi narrates another unforgettable incident of his school days when he picked up a

book named as ‘Shravana Pitribhakti Nataka’ (a play about Shravana’s devotion to his

parents) from his father’s library. Again the same story occurred before him in the form of

visual movie, then at last he couldn’t spare himself to utter “here is an example for you to

copy” as it left an indelible impression on his mind. He wrote that once his heart was

captured by the play ‘Harishchandra’ because the protagonist had undergone through ordeals

to prove himself to be truthful. It inspired him so much that whenever he thought of

Harishchandra’s sufferings, Gandhi sought pain to gain the eternal joy of truth. This story

savoured his mind with purity, beauty and divinity and made him understood:

All pleasures and all pains, remembering

The bough of summer and the winter branch.

These are the measures destined for her soul (Walllace Stevens 1915)

These lines denote that emotions and perceptions are man-made whether for oneself, for

others or for nature’s beauteous objects and these possess divinity and harmony within

Page 3: Gandhi paper in gjell

80

Global Journal of English Language and Literature April 2013. Volume 1. Issue 2. ISSN 2320-4397 Website: https://sites.google.com/site/globaljournalofell/

themselves not outside, therefore Gandhi too found that the behaviour, the attitude that

renders tolerance, passion, boisterous devotion and quest for pleasure as a means to the

fullness of life, is the basis of heaven in life. This story of ‘Harishchandra’ purged out his

fear and pity and cleansed his mind and body of the illusory baggage. His emotional

intelligence understood the dichotomy of good versus bad; negative versus positive; real

versus fantastic; truthful versus art; essence versus existence.

Gandhi places on record the marital truths of his life, when he was too pre-occupied

with the carnal desires of marriage. He writes: “I was devoted to my parents. But no less was

I devoted to the passions that flesh is heir to. (MEWT, 9) Further he says that: -‘I had to make

good my authority as a husband!’” (MEWT: 11) So he tried another way to control her and

he asked her to take lessons from him, as he did not want her to remain illiterate any longer.

But he himself was so fond of her that he was in tight corner between his passion and duty.

Later he regretted in his confession that “I am sure that, had my love for her been absolutely

untainted with lust; she would be a learned lady today.”(MEWT: 12) This emotional lyricism

of Gandhi states that he used to consider himself as the absolute authority in place of being

relative in his nature. He was not a flowing being. He cared for his wife but with a sense of

possession and obsession not with nurturing relationship. He realised that emotions are

transitory and behaviour vis-à-vis emotions is too impressionistic. If he had not done this

mistake, his wife would be literate then. Hence the repentance on his part is emotional

intelligence to convey his regrets and his intentions and later to accept his mistake. This

manifests his well-being, others need to learn from his mistakes.

Symbolically Gandhi’s image is projected as potential mystic by investing his

memories and mistakes in his confessional writing and builds an infrastructure to explore his

pragmatic self through many dimensions. Gandhi had valued emotional optimism to work out

“his ability to manage feelings and handle stress that is another aspect of emotional

intelligence that has been formed to be important for success.”(Newman 2008). He was too

intelligent to emotionally play the relevance of his action over the reactions of others. When

English friends tried to persuade Gandhi to eat meat, (one of them read to him from

Bentham’s Theory of Utility. Gandhi replied to their request or recommendation: ‘These

abstruse things are beyond me, Gandhi pleaded; he would not break the vow he had given to

his mother’ (MEWT). Gandhi might appear to be adamant on his act, but it was his secret

Page 4: Gandhi paper in gjell

81

Global Journal of English Language and Literature April 2013. Volume 1. Issue 2. ISSN 2320-4397 Website: https://sites.google.com/site/globaljournalofell/

way to beautifully nurture his relationship with his origin, with his self, with his dear ones

and he established the fact that gratification do pleases the temptations but it wrecks the soul

because fulfilling the physical urge is unlimited and it stifles happiness.

The book ‘Hind Swaraj’ confronts with human reality in relation to situations, the

origin and the nature of value. It means that if Indians wished to be recognized or to be

projected as being-for –itself, then they have to determine their choice, anguish, freedom and

its consequences in context of moral self- existence. There is interplay of existence and

essence. The ethical meaning of human consciousness, human projection of emotional

optimism is represented in human conduct. If these are the percepts of human outlook,

naturally the bliss of existence is achieved and the essence gets its goal of eternal actions that

may benefit mankind. These are the thoughts that Gandhi tried to imbibe through his seminal

work ‘Hind Swaraj’. He expressed his dissent about the jobs of lawyers. Lawyers in India,

whose profession opposes Indian values and tradition of Svadharma have been described by

Gandhiji as an editor in answer to the question;

Reader: Who would have protected the poor, who would have shown us the road to

independence, who would have protected the poor?

Editor: All I am concerned with is to show you that the profession teaches

immortality; It is exposed to temptations from which few are saved.7 (Hind Swaraj

1997: 58)

The above mentioned dialogue portrays Gandhi as an idealist, moralist, ethical and didactic

but this did not happen to him when he joined or practiced the job of law in South Africa

from 1894 until 1914. He used to earn ‘five to six thousand pounds’ a year’ (Fischer 1951,

74). He was disbarred from inner Temple in 1922 for he was hired as legal counsel to Indian

Muslim Trading Firm operating in South Africa. Then again he was posthumously reinstated

in 1928. Thus we can observe that he too was creatively successful due to his emotional

intelligence, yet inside his soul the inner voice haunted his living possession and he found

that he lacks compatibility between existence-for-itself and being –in–itself. This objective

existential attitude of Gandhi could have won him laurels and could have made him reach to

the stage of being-in-itself, but his human emotions still could not convince him his eternal

success. This self-evident intuition legitimizes his empirical investigation that the lawyer’s

Page 5: Gandhi paper in gjell

82

Global Journal of English Language and Literature April 2013. Volume 1. Issue 2. ISSN 2320-4397 Website: https://sites.google.com/site/globaljournalofell/

profession is to be practiced for the comprehension of other’s predicament and that is the best

choice of moral description of salvation by means of others. He writes, “in South Africa he

discovered that when we go to court of law, some of us are only concerned how to win the

case at any cost and not how truth may prevail”(CW. Vol.10: 147-8). He writes further that,

“during the twenty years of my practice as a lawyer I was occupied in bringing about private

compromises of hundreds of cases. I lost nothing thereby – not even money, certainly not my

soul. (CW. Vol.39: 111)

Through these comments Gandhi meant the moral integrity of human mind, body and

soul as true, fair, and faithful to attain eternal goals of humanity and immortality. These are

the underlying values in order to be priori good. In this context of Gandhi it is apt to state a

French philosopher who writes: There is no reality except in action. Man is nothing else than

his plan; he exists only to the extent that he fulfills himself; he is therefore nothing else than

the ensemble of his acts, nothing else than his life.11 Gandhi’s life and actions were far away

from any dogma, doctrine, ideology, theory and thought. The significant aspect of his

conduct was that he derived knowledge out of his daily circumstances; he gained the ability

to discriminate the good activity and bad activity. This knowledge he attained when he

engaged his mind constantly in search of truth and confession even though his body drove

him to the worldly temptations. Instead of being frustrated, depressed he sought the path of

bliss, learning wisdom and restored his self to renounce desires so that it might not bring

satiety and astray him from the path of ‘Svadharma’, and on account of the practice of this

vision, he was able to be analytical. He narrates this experience in these words: Whenever

there was an occasion for the expression of loyalty without fuss or ostentation, I readily took

part in it---------.Never in my life I exploit this loyalty, never did I seek to gain a selfish end

by its means. It was for me more in the nature of an obligation, and I rendered it without

expecting a reward. (MEWT: 158)

Gandhi motivated his countrymen, his disciples and followers with this mindset:

Please do not carry unnecessarily on your head the burden of emancipating India.’

Emancipate your own self. Even that burden is very great. Apply everything to

yourself. Nobility of soul consists in realizing that you are yourself India. In your

emancipation is the emancipation of India. All else is make-believe” (CW. Vol.10:

206-7).

Page 6: Gandhi paper in gjell

83

Global Journal of English Language and Literature April 2013. Volume 1. Issue 2. ISSN 2320-4397 Website: https://sites.google.com/site/globaljournalofell/

Gandhi presents here his own experiment that he tested on himself. He taught self-

involvement in the crisis of others, self-practice of those percepts that we wish others to

follow and in this reference he quotes his feelings that occurred between him and Dr. Booth

on the occasion of Queen Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee celebration and everybody was to sing

British National Anthem at Rajkot in India. As my conception of ahimsa went on maturing, I

became more vigilant about my thought and speech. The lines in the Anthem were:

‘Scatter her enemies

And make them fall;

Confound their politics

Frustrate their knavish tricks’(MEWT: 159)

Gandhi says that these lyrics of Anthem particularly jarred upon his sentiment of

ahimsa. These incidents narrated by Gandhiji reflect upon the influences that he sought in

good readings and good companies of the fellow beings. He found ‘the kingdom of God

within him’ by propounding the fact that ‘for the achievement of good ends, good means are

essential’ (Sartre 1957: 32). Gandhi believed that moral values and emotional willingness

stand at cross-roads, do have cross-counters, do go through cross-examination, if there is ‘the

capacity to resist the unjust laws of the State, if they are repugnant to the individual’s moral

conviction and if people are to be trained that they are in a position to balance and control the

authority’ (Agarwal 2003: 518-521)

The political front Gandhi enunciated the thoughtful discourse on moral intelligence

in order to practice equipoise against foreign colonial power. Indeed ‘His Autobiography’, his

seminal work ‘Hind Swaraj’ reveal the outward impression of his character to the readers, but

at the same time his expressions, his emotions, his feelings, his thoughts are a medium of his

man in action and imitation. We find Gandhi’s meditative and argumentative attitude that

effaced him to vindicate the difference of the moral values as against society norms and

emotional conflicts/desires. His self-inner expression communicated dialogue with people

through passive resistance, non-cooperation, civil disobedience, annihilation of internal

instincts of impurities, attainment of self- developed economic means of livelihood,

performance of one’s duty to the nation and to the fellowmen, relocating the unity among the

polarised binaries of Indian culture, history and civilization during pre-colonial era.

Page 7: Gandhi paper in gjell

84

Global Journal of English Language and Literature April 2013. Volume 1. Issue 2. ISSN 2320-4397 Website: https://sites.google.com/site/globaljournalofell/

He presents arguments in his autobiography-‘My Experiments with Truth’ and ‘Hind

Swaraj to state that moral progress is possible if the goals of British civilization is

collaborated and assimilated with an attitude of innovation in the inviolable Indian

civilization ideals of selfless duty, non-violence, truth, cleanliness, freedom from malice,

absence of cruelty and forgiveness. He writes in the chapter ‘Polak Takes the Plunge’:

It has always been my regret that, although I started the Settlement at Phoenix, I could

stay there only for brief periods. My original idea had been gradually to retire from

practice, go and live at the settlement, earn my livelihood by manual work there, and

find the joy of service in the fulfillment of Phoenix. But it was not to be. (MEWT:

279)

He propounded for his own self-development five principles derived from ‘Gita’ i.e. self-

duty, self-dignity, self-reliance, self-restraint and self-capacity and self-discipline. Louis

Fischer writes for Gandhi in this context: the salt treatise made him a vegetarian by choice. In

the beginning was the act, and only then the conviction (LMG: 39).

Mahatma Gandhi submerged completely his interpretations of visual images/

perceptions into the vastness of universal consciousness. His emotional sensibility severed

connections to overcome his illusions, which was one of the qualities that inspired persons

like Shri Vinoba Bhave, Dr, Rajendra Prasad, Shri. J.B.Kriplani, Shri Thakkar Bappa, Shri.

Ravishankar Maharaj, Shri. Jamnalal Bajaj, Shri. Nanabhai Bhatt, Shri. J.C.Kumarappa,

Shrimati Sarojini Naidu, Shri. Rajkumari Amrit Kaur, Shri. Sushila Nayar, Shri

AshadeviAryanayakam, Mirabehn and many others from all walks of life and with an

astonishing richness of head and heart. His teachings reflected the Kantian ethics as regards

the other fellow beings’ ideals / targets that says, ‘never treat any person as a means but as an

end.’ ( Pandya 1994: 34-36).

One of the disciples of Gandhiji was Maganlal Gandhi who was a hard taskmaster and

as such earned resentment from many of his co-dwellers at Kheda, in Rajkot, where a feeling

of unrest was born in the inmates of the Phoenix Ashram. Gandhiji sensed the feeling of

discontent and called a meeting on 17 Feb. 1919 and said:

Page 8: Gandhi paper in gjell

85

Global Journal of English Language and Literature April 2013. Volume 1. Issue 2. ISSN 2320-4397 Website: https://sites.google.com/site/globaljournalofell/

The inmates are satisfied with nothing in the Ashram. The reason? Dissatisfaction

over Maganlal’s ideas and conduct over his manner of speaking and over a certain

partiality in his actions. Lack of faith in the Ashram on the part of others, those in the

school. What is my position in these circumstances? (Mahadevbhaini Diary

(Gujarati), Vol.V )

Here Mahatma’s attachment for the ‘Nishkamkarmayoga’ and care engender the sense of

defense as regards perception of the subject-object rapport. According to Gandhi, moral

intelligence lies in inner transformation when one’s body is not vassal to external and internal

likes and dislikes for they represent disillusionments out of the illusions. It is apt to quote

John Milton to evaluate Gandhi’s approach to dwell upon his concepts and ideas:

Coercive efforts to establish uniformity in morals and opinions, because they are then

sure to fail. He felt that man has a natural right to be free in matters of opinion and

private morals; and peace and happiness flow from a policy of toleration. These can

be possible if we make no rigid discrimination between acts that concern the doer and

those that concern others (1993: 385).

Even J. S. Mill is of the opinion that:

Restraint hampers the intellectual and moral development of the individual restrained,

it deprives society of an indispensable means for discovering truth and securing

its widest and the most effective acceptance; and it makes popular government

impossible (385).

These authors are quoted to explicate Gandhi who with his disciples did strenuous,

rewardless, relentless labours to reap the seeds of progress and prosperity. Interaction,

information, elimination of caste, class, creed, gender and sect discrimination, devotion for

the ideal goals expanded. His efforts just like a huge tree were laden with the fruit of

liberation of India from slavery, subjugation and surrender. It is said that:

Society gains in sanity, health and security by suffering each man to speak his mind

freely, to follow his own feeling, tastes, sentiments to plan his life as best he can

according to his own notion rather than by coercing him into a life approved by his

fellow ( Bent 1928: 142).

Page 9: Gandhi paper in gjell

86

Global Journal of English Language and Literature April 2013. Volume 1. Issue 2. ISSN 2320-4397 Website: https://sites.google.com/site/globaljournalofell/

Gandhi had never read Gita or had chanted / memorized till one day he was told by

two theosophists in London to recite the verses which were the translated version of the

‘Gita’ by Edwind Arnold. Those lines were:

If one ponders on objects of sense, there springs attraction, grows desire, desire

flames to fierce passion, passion breeds recklessness: then the memory – all betrayed

– Lets noble purpose go and saps the mind, till purpose, mind and man are all undone

(MEWT).

These lines caused a deep impact on his mind that his journey of quest for the truth and

renunciation started from that onwards indelibly. His comparative analysis of Bible, Gita and

Old Testament led him to understand religion, ethics, and morals in an applied sense and to

him all manifest that one should not consider oneself as an end in himself but he is a means

towards something, for the sake of self, nation or state.

It is very apt to quote Kautiliya’s concept of ethics and polity in context of Gandhi’s

spiritualization of politics, which can be in other way understood as one of the ways to handle

the circumstances and crisis through moral ideals of life. Kautiliya writes:

Paritranaya Sadhunam Vinashayam Ch Dushkritam

Dharmsansthanathay Sambhavami Yuge Yuge ( Jha. 1999: 36)

These lines explain that wherever and whenever the evil dwells, it ends in catastrophe

because there is incarnation of God in human form to destroy the evil, so that the religion and

faith thrive. These lines were spoken to Arjuna by Lord Krishna in the context of the

existence of devilish deeds of Duryodhana. Arjun was to fight to protect the side of truth. The

lord Krishna then does his counseling why he is to fight against his own cousins. These same

epigrammatic lines are repeated by Kautiliya, the prime minister, before Chandragupta

Maurya, the great king of India in the fourth century B.C. Kautiliya too guided his king that

any action that is evil in its design results in death and disaster, and there is somebody in

human form to protest against that evil design and to set the truth.. The account of how

Gandhi came to coin Satyagrah is given in Collected Works 8:131. Indian Opinion called for

submission of a suitable word for the new movement Gandhi had introduced. Among the

words submitted were pratupaya (counter-measure); kashtadhin parivartan (resistance

through submission to hardship); dridha paripaksha (firmness in resistance); sadagrah

(firmness in a good cause) and satya (truth).

Page 10: Gandhi paper in gjell

87

Global Journal of English Language and Literature April 2013. Volume 1. Issue 2. ISSN 2320-4397 Website: https://sites.google.com/site/globaljournalofell/

Gandhi had no great incarnation of God to guide him, no great Machiavellian

Kautiliya to check him, but he had read that above mentioned sense in the book Unto This

Last that also speaks of the soul and its force:

But he (the worker) being , on the contrary, an engine whose motive power is a Soul,

the force of this very peculiar agent, as an unknown quantity, enters into all the

political economist’s equations….’(Ruskin 1978: 30-1).

Gandhi got reminded of it when he read Gita later. This he applied in his experience during

World War I in 1914. He writes:

I knew the difference of status between an Indian and an Englishman, but I did not

believe that we had been quite reduced to slavery. I felt then that it was more the fault

of individual British officials than of the British system and that we could convert

them by love. If we would improve our status through the help and cooperation of

British, it was our duty to win their help by standing by them in their hour of need.

(XXXVIII My Part in the War. MEWT: 319)

Gandhi wished to abolish dis-alienation. He practically believed that man’s action

should bring him closer to the community, to the society, to the nation; this is possible if

there is freedom, non-violence, kingdom of happiness in place of necessity. His moral

intelligence connects with the idea of Swaraj “Gandhi says that the physical expulsion of the

British from India is not of the essence of Swaraj: self-transformation is , Gandhi the

assimilationist is prepared to welcome ‘Indianised’ Britons as true Indians” ( Hind Swaraj,

1997: 72; all subsequent references will be termed as HS). Gandhi practiced the highest

repository of reality and power, which is described by a writer in this way: “For him power

need not be violent, and could be won through non-violent action…..Gandhi insisted that

lasting power can be built only on the goodwill of the people and needs to be supported by

them” (Jain 2001: 249).

For Gandhi –the true law is Sathyam Prtyapi Shatyam (Vidvans: 284) (truth even to

the cunning) Suffering and sword are two variables just as ahimsa and himsa are.

He narrates an incident that can motivate us all to look into the endeavours, struggles, and

sufferings from this point of view. During the World War II, when Hitler overran Norway,

Page 11: Gandhi paper in gjell

88

Global Journal of English Language and Literature April 2013. Volume 1. Issue 2. ISSN 2320-4397 Website: https://sites.google.com/site/globaljournalofell/

Denmark, Holland and Belgium, France was his next subjugation while Japan has captured

some position of Thailand, stuck at Pearl Harbour and heading to ransack British Malaya ;

Gandhi reacted to the situation because at that time Britons’ stock became low in India: We

do not seek our independence out of Britain’s ruin. That is not the way of non-violence.

(LMG: 144)

This he proposed to suggest that if the Indians support Britain in war effort that is

symbolic of life and death, then Indians would be there on fronts not to initiate killing rather

to preach non-violence. But when the Viceroy of India on behalf of Churchill refused to

accept this, Gandhi waged passive resistance to protest against the war and India’s

helplessness. He observed fast and led one after the other freedom fighters to plunge

themselves in this cause by way of imprisonment. Those were Vinoba Bhave, Maulana Abul

Kalam Azad, Nehru, Sardar Patel etc. That coerced Churchill to declare in 1935: Gandhism

and all that it stands for must ultimately be grappled with and finally crushed. Because it

stood for India’s independence (LMG: 445). Gandhi combined ethics in polity by saying that

‘violent means will give violent swaraj. That would be menace to the world and to India

herself’ (Young India 1924).

The statements are the appropriate example of emotional ethics that Churchill

conveyed to his countrymen whereas moral ethics that Gandhi had given to native Indians.

The former had to hand over India to Indians without any grudges because they suffered

heavy losses on account of their emotional intelligence to cooperate with other allies so to

win their favour; while Gandhi used moral intelligence to cooperate with Britain and its allies

to win the hearts so to set an example that ahimsa is a higher reality of beautiful creation of

God and himsa is a disillusionment to destroy the beauty and truth.

It is worth to quote a spiritual guru to understand how Gandhi used to fight back the

negative perception and attitude of others: “We often fight our emotions. Then we feel bad.

We experience emotions as positive or negative, because of our personal choices and actions”

(Nonawalia 2010: 3). Gandhi comments upon Hindu-Muslim row over cow protection that:

The only method I know of protecting the cow is that I should approach my

Mahommedan brother and urge him for the sake of the country to join me in

protecting her. If he would not listen to me, I should let the cow go for the simple

Page 12: Gandhi paper in gjell

89

Global Journal of English Language and Literature April 2013. Volume 1. Issue 2. ISSN 2320-4397 Website: https://sites.google.com/site/globaljournalofell/

reason that matter is beyond my ability. If I were overfull of pity for the cow, I should

sacrifice my life to save her, but not take my brother’s. This, I hold, in the law of our

religion. (HS: 54)

He used to bring himself to such briefless state that he writes in the chapter ‘Warning’

that: “The soul has nothing to do with what one eats or drinks, as the soul neither eats nor

drinks; that it is not what you put inside from without, but what you express outwardly from

within, that matter” (MEWT: 83).

The instances of his emotional sensibility are abundant when he was in England to

study law, or when he was with his wife and family, when he could not resist himself from

being swayed by western standards, when he was a practicing lawyer either in India or in

South Africa or as a teacher in South Africa or as freedom fighter in the Liberation struggle

of India. But simultaneously we also find his moral ethics as regards his stand for truth when

he tries to confess fearlessly his actions of cheating, meat-eating, carnal lust for his wife, or

stealing stumps of cigarette etc. We see his perseverance in the form of Satyagrah when he

opposes Britishers’ ruthless massacre at Jalianwalabagh tragedy, when Mohammadens attack

on him in South Africa as regards his support for registration laws of transported Indians as

indentured laborers.

.

For instance he writes to clarify that violence can help to reach to the temporary goal

of rebuffing the evil-doer, but the violence cannot be an end – must not be a weapon for the

person in power and in strength, it may be a means to helplessness incase of dishonor:

But I believe that non-violence is infinitely superior to violence, forgiveness is more

manly than punishment (Mandal 2009: 35-40).

Gandhi disseminated positive energy not only through common day to day

experiences of life, even the persons whom he interacted or in association with, made him

enlightened. The reason of his being closer to enlightenment was that he used to

trancendentalise into the thought-process of the other.

References:

Page 13: Gandhi paper in gjell

90

Global Journal of English Language and Literature April 2013. Volume 1. Issue 2. ISSN 2320-4397 Website: https://sites.google.com/site/globaljournalofell/

Agarwal, R.C. Political Theory. 2003. New Delhi: S. Chand & Company Ltd. Print.

Bent, Silas. 1928. “Freedom of Speech, Conscience and the Press”, Freedom in the Modern

World. Ed. H. M. Kallen. Print.

Cherniss, Cary. 2000. Emotional Intelligence: What it is and Why it matters. Psychology,

New Orleans, LA. Print.

Fischer, Louis. 1951. The Life of Mahatma Gandhi. London: Harper Collins Publ. (All

subsequent references will be termed as LMG) Print.

Gandhi, M.K. 2008. India of My Dreams. New Delhi: Rajpal & Sons. Print

Gandhi, M.K. 1924. Young India. Print.

Gandhi, M.K. Hind Swaraj. 1997. New Delhi: Foundation Book. Print.

Gandhi. 1927, Rpt. 2008. My Experiments with Truth. New Delhi: Navajivan Publishing

House. Print

Gandhi. Collected Works Vol.10 (All subsequent references will be termed as CW) Print.

Gandhi. M.K. 1997. How Can India became free? Hind Swaraj. New Delhi:

Cambridge UP. Print.

Jain, Tripathi. 2001. Mainstreams of Contemporary Political Thoughts. Modern Political

Theories. New Delhi: College Book Depot. Print.

Jha, V.N. 1999. Kautiliya Arthashastra and Social Welfare. New Delhi: Sahitya

Akademi. Print.

Mandal, Ravi C. 2009. The Moral and Political Writings of Mahatma Gandhi. Manglam

Publications: New Delhi. Print.

Page 14: Gandhi paper in gjell

91

Global Journal of English Language and Literature April 2013. Volume 1. Issue 2. ISSN 2320-4397 Website: https://sites.google.com/site/globaljournalofell/

Martyn Newman 2008. Emotional Capitalist. Jossey-Bass: US. Print.

Mill, J.S. Recent Political Thought. Print.

Milton, John. 1993. Recent Political Thought. Ed. Francis W. Coker. New Delhi: The

World Press . Print.

Nona Walia. 2010. Times News Network. Sunday (January) 3. Print.

Pandya, Jayanta. 1994, Rpt. 2008. Gandhi and His Disciples. India: National Book Trust.

Print.

Ruskin, John. 1978. Ed. Yarker. Print.

Sartre, Jean Paul. 1957. Existentialism and Human Emotions. NY: The Wisdom Library.

Print.

Stevens Wallace. 1915. Sunday Morning. Print

Vidvans, M.D. Ed. Letters to the Lokmanya Tilak. Poona: Kesari Prakashan. Print.

Wechsler, David. 1958. The Measurement and Appraisal of Adult Intelligence (fourth ed.).

Baltimore (MD): Williams & Witkins. Print.