Mahatma Gandhi's Life and Legacy

• Mahatma Gandhi was born on October 2, 1869, in a Hindu family in coastal Gujarat.
• He trained as a lawyer and was called to the bar at age 22 in 1891.
• Gandhi moved to South Africa in 1893 to represent an Indian merchant in a lawsuit.
• In 1915, aged 45, he returned to India and soon set about organizing peasants, farmers, and urban labourers to protest against excessive land-tax and discrimination.
• Gandhi assumed leadership of the Indian National Congress in 1921.
• He led nationwide campaigns for easing poverty, expanding womens rights, building religious and ethnic amity, ending untouchability, and, above all, achieving swaraj or self-rule.
• Gandhi adopted the short dhoti woven with hand-spun yarn as a mark of identification with Indias rural poor.
• He began to live in a self-sufficient residential community, to eat simple food, and undertake long fasts as a means of both introspection and political protest.
• Gandhi was imprisoned many times and for many years in both South Africa and India.
• In 1947, Britain granted independence to India and the British Indian Empire was partitioned into two dominions, a Hindu-majority India and a Muslim-majority Pakistan.
• Gandhi refused to celebrate independence and visited the affected areas following the partition.
• Gandhi undertook several hunger strikes in the months following the partition in an attempt to stop religious violence.
• The last of these, begun in Delhi on January 12, 1948, had the indirect goal of pressuring India to pay out some cash assets owed to Pakistan.

Mahatma Gandhi was a successful lawyer and political ethicist who employed nonviolent resistance to lead the successful campaign for Indias independence from British rule and to later inspire movements for civil rights and freedom across the world. He is best known for his philosophy of nonviolent resistance and his campaigns against untouchability and for ending poverty. Following independence in 1947, Gandhi remained active in politics and served as the first Prime Minister of India from 1947 to 1948. He died on January 30, 1948, at the age of 80.

Test your knowledge on the life and achievements of Mahatma Gandhi, the influential leader who led India to independence through nonviolent resistance and fought for social justice and equality. This quiz covers his early life, political career, philosophy, and impact on the world.