I was recently reading an article about Gandhi (http://www.deeshaa.org/2010/01/22/bose-gandhi-ghadar-and-indias-independence/) which got me thinking as to what has gone wrong with the phenomena of Gandhi. Strangely though i agreed with a lot of things that people say about Gandhi, like him being wily, i could not find myself disliking him.
Gandhi's role, i agree, has been overplayed at a lot of places at the expense of a lot of other people like Bose.
But taking down Gandhi because the other freedom fighters have not been given there dues, is like taking down Cricket, because Hockey is not famous. Why cant we focus on rebuilding Hockey. Similarly why cant we focus on understanding and spreading the word around about other leaders rather than trying to bring down Gandhi.
According to me Gandhi is idolized because he was 'phenomena'. He wasn't perfect but he was unique, innovative and experimental in his approach. And all experiments don't succeed, but the most unique ones do get famous. He found in 'non violence' an ideology that could empower the weakest of the weak. An ideology that could actually make the supressed feel 'greater' than the oppressor, in moral terms. Going by the brick for brick philosophy according to him just ended up creating more demons and more wars in the world.
Gandhi's was a perspective that influenced a lot of people not just in India but the world over. He re-looked at the way battles can be fought. He brought to popular notice concepts that were unheard in the times of the world wars. Not for no reason have people like MLK and Einstein been influenced by Gandhi's philosophy.
His approach towards Bose, as i think of it, was like that of a conservative father whose son wanted to make a career in sports. Now the disagreement of the father doesn't stem for his disliking of his son but from the fact that he hasn't seen or doesn't believe that sports have any future. Now this scenario doesn't make the son or the father wrong, 'cause the father wants him to have a safe future while the son sees his passion and success in sports. It just different perspectives.
The carefully created image that we often talk about is the only Gandhi we know, and probably need to care about, because that 'image' was what brought the country together in many ways. Even Steve Jobs is ego maniacal, but that doesn't stop us from praising him for the paradigm-shift he has brought about in the tech industry.
Gandhi surely was not without his issues, but like it or not he was the focal point which had the charisma to create a truly national movement which brought everyone into its fold, women and children included. As i see it Gandhi, may be was more pro-peace than pro-independence.
Making each individual believe that in him or her is the strength and the weapon to fight an empire, is no easy task. He was what people created of him. Even Sachin Tendulkar has a carefully crafted public image. He has been part of many individual valiant efforts in games that India lost. But still we love him, cause he was our first super hero. Similarly Gandhi was the first out of the world 'phenomena' that could speak and argue with the British in their language sitting across a table while also being able to empathize with a harijan and think about his upliftment. On a side-note, one of his most important contributions to India (though surely there were people before him that had done this) was trying to break down the rigid walls of caste-ism in India.
Today we can look back at history and say that many of the decisions he made were wrong and that he is overhyped. But that does not take away from the man that he was.
We probably need to look at him as a scientist who was experimenting in a new philosophy, trying to create a formula for peace, or as an ordinary human finding his mojo in giving hope to millions of people through his philosophy, aura and oratory or if may be as a pink floydish musician who could play awesome experimental rock which mesmerized the masses but didn't quite mean much to the death metal fans.
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