Gandhi

Mohandas Karmachand Gandhi, born October 2nd 1869, was a common Indian peasant who later became a national hero in the quest for Indian independence from colonial Great Briton. Gandhi is most remembered for his stanch support of nonviolent protest and civil disobedience as a way of overturning oppressive government and making radical changes in India. Although Gandhi died in 1948 the effects of his campaign for Indian independence are still far reaching and it is copied by many others who have also fought against oppression such as Martin Luther King Jr., The Dalia Lama and Nelson Mandela.

Gandhi's beliefs about nonviolence were created at a very young age because his mother was a devoted Hindu who believed deeply in nonviolence. Gandhi eventually was accepted to the University of Bombay in 1887 although his grades were quite poor. He later decided that he would instead attend school in England, which he considered to be "a land of philosophers and poets", upon this decision his mother made him take a vow to observe the Hindu practice of not consuming alcohol or meat. While he was attending the University Collage London he soon began to question his Hindu belief that it is not morally right to eat meat, but he soon found that he couldn't eat meat and ended up staying a vegetarian. Gandhi originally was a vegetarian to placate his mother, but he soon started reading about the morality of eating other living things and found that he agreed with his mother. After Gandhi had this revelation he joined the Vegetarian Society of Great Briton, where he met many of his "Philosophers and Poets" and started to take great interest in all religions. He even went so far as to start a local chapter of the vegetarian society which he soon became head of; this is where Gandhi got his first leadership experience.

Once Gandhi got his degree and passed the British Bar (a test qualifying oneself to practice law), which at that time as also the bar for India due to Britons control over India. At this point Gandhi, who was now married and had two children of his own, moved back to India to practice law. He did not have much success as a lawyer and figured his law degree would be enough to get him a part time job at Bombay High School; he ended up not getting the job and had to take on a job in South Africa as an ambulance driver.

Gandhi himself has said that his time in South Africa was a turning point in his life when he began to notice the oppressive levels of control Briton put on its colonies and those who lived there. Although Gandhi says it was what he saw here that made him organize the Indian people into a unified peaceful resistance group, he did not at first think the British were unfair in their dealings with the blacks who lived in South Africa; in fact Gandhi himself has been recorded saying racist things about the "inferior" blacks. He considers the specific turning point to be when he was ordered by a court magistrate to remove his turban and he refused and was ordered out of the room. Another just as important event occurred while he was in South Africa, the event that