Biographie de Gandhi (document en anglais)

Born on October 2, 1869, in Porbandar, India, Mohandas Gandhi studyed law and came to aggravate for Indian rights both at home and in South Africa.

He became a leader of India's independence movement, organizing boycotts against British institutions in peaceful forms of civil disobience.

He was given the holy name Mahatmas. He was killed by a hindou fanatic in 1948.

Personal information:

An important experience in his life is his fight in India. Back to India in 1914, it was decided to put an end to colonial exploitation of his country, without spilling a drop of blood. It does this by 1947, through a program of non-cooperation (boycott schools, courts, and British goods) and vigils, as the 'salt march'.

This person is important because as a pioneer of Satyagraha, or resistance through mass non-violent civil disobedience, he became one of the major political and spiritual leaders of his time. Satyagraha remains one of the most potent philosophies in freedom struggles throughout the world today.

He grew up surrounded by religious traditions of compassion, vegetarianism, and tolerance for all people. He got married at the age of 13. When he was 19, he went to London to study law. He returned to India to practice as a lawyer but was hampered by British officials, so he accepted a job in South Africa.

In South Africa, Gandhi faced discrimination and hardship wherever he

went. He was treated as a third-class citizen by white people. This

awakened in him questions about social justice and the role of the

British in India. He returned to India in 1915, ready to put to work the

concept of passive resistance he developed in South Africa.

Between 1916 and 1945, Gandhi campaigned tirelessly to set India

free from British rule. He started by leading protests against British

taxes and landlords, and walked across India encouraging noncooperation with the British. He was arrested and imprisoned for

creating unrest. Gandhi's fame spread all over the nation. He was

assassinated in 1948. Two years later, India became an independent

republic.

Following his civil disobedience campaign (1919-22), he was jailed for conspiracy (1922-4). In 1930, he led a landmark 320 km/200 mi march to the sea to collect salt in symbolic defiance of the government monopoly. On his release from prison (1931), he attended the London Round Table Conference on Indian constitutional reform. In 1946, he negotiated with the Cabinet Mission which recommended the new constitutional structure

Even after his death, Gandhi's commitment to non-violence and his belief in simple living--making his own clothes, eating a vegetarian diet, and using fasts for self-purification as well as a means of protest--have been a beacon of hope for oppressed and marginalized people throughout the world.

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