While the 21st century has been defined by globalization, free markets, privatization, liberalization, information age, technology, innovations, and the rise of democracy, it has also been marked by violence, extremism, problems of inequity, poverty and disparity. Amidst all this, if one poses the question of relevance of Gandhiji to our age, one is stuck by an astounding need for him for our times. Gandhi’s ideals about equality, non violence, truth, sacrifice, love and leadership hold an extremely relevant moral and social mirror to our society.
Gandhiji is part of the national consciousness of India and an enduring icon of the freedom struggle. Gandhiji’s lifetime dedication to the struggles of a national is a story of immense courage, sacrifice and unwavering character. Personally, hailing from a Gujarati family, Gandhian ideal were part of my psyche from a young age and were inextricably intertwined with my beliefs and ideas. As my parents migrated to Orissa in search of work, the invisible thread that bound them to their homeland in Gujarat was the figure of Gandhiji. One of my earliest memories is when on Gandhiji’s death our entire family had to mourn the loss as if a part of the family had died. While Gandhiji was a great leader who held the imagination of a nation, his ideals have become increasingly part of lessons in books or moral diatribes. He has been placed on a pedestal so high that his teachings have become remote and unconnected from our everyday lives. Now more than ever he needs to be reclaimed from the space of discussion and debate to the real world.
Gandhiji can mean different things to different people – father of the nation, leader, decolonizer, freedom fighter, lone challenger, promoter of non violent resistance, a pristine idea or even a belief system. To me personally, Gandhiji stands for simplicity, sense of sacrifice, service to people, perseverance, unconditional love for all, real concern for the underprivileged and minorities, truth and absolute truth, single standard of conduct in public and private life, personal virtues and pubic values. Each of these qualities appears so easily attainable on the face of it, but so very hard to actually uphold. And yet each one of them encompasses relevance that transcends a specific period of history.
When you look at Gandhiji throughout his mature life you see how well he had internalized the meaning of the four aspects which have the capacity to determine our actions the reactions – maan, apmaan, abhimaan, and swabhimaan. This understanding gave him fundamental clarity of character and strength of action to finally shake the foundations of an empire and capture the hopes and dreams of a nation with multiple identities. It was this rare ability to balance these four aspects that elevated Gandhiji to a level most public figures can only dream of, but at the same time helped him keep his feet on the ground. There is nothing in these four aspects that come with an expiry date on their relevance. Over and above this, he was unparalleled team builder with a steadfastly strong self, a global outlook and orientation, but with a finger on the pulse of the people at home as well as their aspirations and needs.
While assessing Gandhiji’s relevance a common mistake that a lot of people make is to focus on some of the more spiritual and even puritanical beliefs of the man. While those have their own relevance for the scholars of history and psychology of historical figures, for most of us what matters are things that we can do in everyday life without feeling the burden of his very complex personality. One of the most striking strengths of Gandhiji was his extraordinary ability to boil a hugely complicated political / economic issue down to a symbol that even the poorest in India could passionately relate to. In this context the famous Dandi Salt March comes to mind. For a man right at the heart of an independence campaign unrivalled in history to zero in on a symbol that would capture the nation’s imagination highlights the way his mind worked and the method of his communication.
Another great aspect of relevance was his strength as a team builder. Just one glance at the galaxy of leaders, each one of them a steadfast individual in his or her own right, that rallied around Gandhiji as a team illustrates Gandhiji’s abilities to unite disparate individuals into a cohesive political and social force.
As an engineer it is my professional and personal discipline to break everything down to specific points. People often ask me what I believe to be Gandhiji’s three greatest strengths that remain relevant in our times. While there are many more than three, in the interest of brevity I would enlist them here.
Gandhiji’s biggest strength, which is a kind of an umbrella under which his entire life’s work can be covered, was his splendid skill as a communicator. This is an overarching gift that defines Gandhiji during any and every phase of his public life. Anyone who could say “My life is my message” had to have understood and fully digested the great power of effective communication. Living in an era that was largely without the support of many modern-day communication tools, Gandhiji had to think on his feet in any given public situation. Not blessed with great oratorical skills, Gandhiji knew enough to mine his innate capacity as a clear thinker and succinct communicator. Although his speeches lacked the flourish and force of some of some of his his contemporaries he never fell short on the content. Gandhiji, according to me, was the greatest communicator who ever lived.
At a time when the world is getting so sharply polarized along religious, economic and cultural lines, the need for a global communicator who understands local sensibilities cannot be overstated. That ability alone makes Gandhiji relevant for all time to come. Every device he used as a vehicle for his message was careful chosen, whether it was his writings in the Harijan or Young India, his brilliant use of a handful of salt during the Dandi march, the charkha to spin out khadi, oaths of silence and fasts or songs such as ‘Vaishnav Jan to tene kehiye.’ Everything that he did was designed to convey alacrity of purpose in the simplest of symbolism that the poorest and the illiterate Indian could identify with.
His second biggest strength was his ability to innovate in order to effect paradigm shifts and introduce transformational ideas such as civil disobedience and satyagraha. He turned the violence and oppression of the British Empire on its head by waging a new kind of war fought on the grounds of peace, courage and unwavering resistance. He was a true innovator who understood the need to challenge conventional processes and systems. He also understood how to effect local innovations that benefit local people. By going back to khadi and the charkha he instinctively underlined the need for an Indian model of innovation, suited to Indian needs and context. This legacy is as relevant in today’s globally competitive world as it was during colonial times, because it highlights that India has to leverage its own strengths and meet the needs of its people through innovations suited to unique Indian challenges.
Gandhiji’s third biggest strength was his leadership that stemmed from his messianic self belief. That was the reason why be could take huge political risks and back up his political convictions and actions with such finality. By steadfastly placing the interests of the Indian people at the heart of his endeavours, he elevated politics and leadership to a new level. He provides a model of leadership for the 21st century that is propelled by morals, ethics, purpose and priority.
While it is tempting to focus on specific aspects of Gandhiji’s life and discuss their relevance to our times, what is more important is to understand the man in his entirety. You would always find that Gandhiji’s whole was always so much bigger than the sum of his parts.
Above all this, what sets Gandhiji apart from the rest of his contemporaries was that even in the late 19th and early to mind 20th centuries he was truly a 21st century leader. He intuitively understood information culture and the need to make information accessible to galvanise people and create a movement. All the ingredients of a modern information age person resided in Gandhiji. He stood for openness, accessibility, connectivity, decentralization and democratization, all the fundamental building blocks of the information age.
None of what Gandhiji did in terms of practicing those values seemed laboured. It appeared like a seamless whole even though it was often on display in bits and pieces. It is entirely possible that Gandhiji polished and perfected his style and substance as he went along, but he still gave one the impression that he had already thought it all up before he embarked on his public life. This was also possible because Gandhiji essentially took substantial time to internalize many of the core issues and values he believed in so that they became a part of his everyday lifestyle.
Gandhiji truly was a man of his times and of all times. He stands out today as a symbol of courage, character, conviction, purity, perseverance, sacrifice, discipline, leadership, innovation and a lot more.
Sam Pitroda
No comments:
Post a Comment