Notes on the Indian Independence movement and Gandhi's leadership.
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Introductory Notes:
● India was the linchpin of the British Empire; spices and cloths from India were
good sources of business for the Imperial Crown
● 1.5m Indians fought for the British during WW1 reflecting the status of India
as Britain’s “barrack” in the East
● Before Gandhi rose to prominence, nationalism was a concept confined to the
elites and well-mannered; the members of the Indian National Congress (who
knew of and understood nationalism) were well-educated/ out of touch
● Those leading the nationalist movement before Gandhi were also
well-mannered; in being unwilling to demonstrate force, they would often turn
to soft forms of pressure to try and achieve their aims (e.g., writing letters)
● Gandhi was London-educated before moving to South Africa; in South Africa,
Gandhi organized campaigns with his fellow Indians to oppose discriminatory
legislation based on race
● Gandhi wrote and published his book Hind Swaraj in 1909-10
● Gandhi warned against the entire imitation of Western technology within India
● Satyagraha= Truth force (disobedience to existing laws was acceptable if
such laws were unjust)
Gandhi and the Terrorists (Durba Ghosh):
● Although traditional scholarship has stressed Gandhi’s strong disgust towards
political violence, his views were informed in dialogue over the course of his
lifetime with extremists and radicals
● Gandhi recognized how both violence and nonviolence reflected the ability to
sacrifice, to suffer and to gain the attention of the British
● Just law as an absolute truth was held by Gandhi as a standard both Indians
and Britons could judge themselves by; based on this, Gandhi maintained
that the prolonged detention of terrorists defied norms in a just society
● There were several assassination attempts before 1909 which reflected the
extent of the campaign undertaken by Indian extremists to push for
independence
● There were two attempts to kill the lieutenant-governor of Bengal (Andrew
Fraser) in 1907 and 1908
● 1 July 1909- British officer Curzon Wyllie was shot dead at close range by
Madanlal Dhingra; Dhingra was an extremist who had been inspired by the
works of Vinayak Savarkar
● Various accounts of Gandhi’s life suggest that upon hearing Savarkar speak
in London, Gandhi was motivated to write his now-famous work Hind Swaraj
in response
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