Mahatma gandhi

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi
2 October 1869 30 January 1948, commonly known as Mahatma Gandhi, was the preeminent leader of Indian nationalism in British-ruled India. Employing non-violent civildisobedience, Gandhi led India to independence and inspired movements for non-violence, civil rights and freedom across the world.
Son of a senior government official, Gandhi was born and raised in aHindu Bania community in coastal Gujarat, and trained in law in London. Gandhi became famous by fighting for the civil rights of Muslim and Hindu Indians in South Africa, using the new techniques ofnon-violent civil disobedience that he developed. Returning to India in 1915, he set about organising peasants to protest excessive land-taxes. A lifelong opponent of "communalism" (i.e. basing politicson religion) he reached out widely to all religious groups. He became a leader of Muslims protesting the declining status of the Caliphate. Assuming leadership of the Indian National Congress in1921, Gandhi led nationwide campaigns for easing poverty, expanding women's rights, building religious and ethnic amity, ending untouchability, increasing economic self-reliance, and above all forachieving Swaraj—the independence of India from British domination.
In his last year, unhappy at the partition of India, Gandhi worked to stop the carnage between Muslims on the one hand and Hindus andSikhs that raged in the border area between India and Pakistan. He was assassinated on 30 January 1948 by a Hindu nationalist who thought Gandhi was too sympathetic to India's Muslims. 30 January isobserved as Martyrs' Day in India. The honourific Mahatma (Sanskrit: mahāt̪mā) or "Great Soul", was applied to him by 1914. In India he was also called Bapu (Gujarati: bāpuː or "Father"). He is known inIndia as the Father of the Nation; his birthday, 2 October, is commemorated there as Gandhi Jayanti, a national holiday, and world-wide as the International Day of Non-Violence. The title of 'Father...