Mahatma Gandhi's Life and Achievements

• Mahatma Gandhi was born on October 2, 1869, in the coastal town of Porbandar, Gujarat, India.
• Gandhi trained as a lawyer and moved to South Africa in 1893 to represent an Indian merchant.
• In 1915, aged 45, Gandhi returned to India and soon began organising peasants, farmers, and urban labourers to protest against excessive land-tax and discrimination.
• Gandhi assumed leadership of the Indian National Congress in 1921 and 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.
• Gandhi 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 an attempt to stop religious violence. The last of these, begun in Delhi in January 1948, had the indirect goal of pressuring India to pay out some cash assets owed to Pakistan.

Mahatma Gandhi was born on October 2, 1869, in the coastal town of Porbandar, Gujarat, India. He trained as a lawyer and moved to South Africa in 1893 to represent an Indian merchant. In 1915, aged 45, Gandhi returned to India and soon began organising peasants, farmers, and urban labourers to protest against excessive land-tax and discrimination. He assumed leadership of the Indian National Congress in 1921 and 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. He undertook several hunger strikes in an attempt to stop religious violence. The last of these, begun in Delhi in January 1948, had the indirect goal of pressuring India to pay