Talk:Mahatma Gandhi

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[edit] Gandhi's Thougths about Turkish Indepedence War and Mustafa Kemal Ataturk

I saw that there is no information about Gandhi's thougths in Turkish Indepedence War and Kemalism. Gandhi was supporting Mustafa Kemal's revolutionist ideas as a solution for 3rd World Countries. He was supporting the Turkish Indepedence War against imperialists and finding Kemalism as a solution for third world countries, he was seeing Kemalism as a pacifist ideology. If any of the wikipedists could have put this information with its details, it would be better. Thank you...

[edit] Page Coding or Other Error

(1)Why does it say "Hi There Beller" in the opening paragraph? (fixed?) (2)And why is Derek Jeter's name mentioned in the "Early Life" section, second paragraph?

[edit] Move article to Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi?

Just wondering, since his name was actually Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi and the introduction says so as well, shouldn't the article be under that name instead of Mahatma, which is an adulation/title?Rueben lys 12:52, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] "Artistic depictions" edits and...

Please see the changes made in Mahatma Gandhi. The subsection "Artistic depictions" was shortened, and a new daughter article (Artistic depictions of Mahatma Gandhi) created by shifting contents from Mahatma Gandhi. Please see if the changes are ok.

Also, the subsection "Mahatma" - does it merit a seperate seb-section at all? The thing can be discussed in lead, or in other places, with the mostly believed idea (that Rabindranath Tagore named him Mahatma) stated...and with a footnote describing the other claim(s). Regards.--Dwaipayan (talk) 18:02, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Citation needed, shortening needed

The following portion needs citation and shortening:

"Mohandas Gandhi's sleeping arrangements attracted public attention during the winter of 1946-47, when he was trying to quell violence between Muslims and Hindus in the Noakhali district in what is now Bangladesh. It came out that Gandhi was sleeping nightly with his 19-year-old grandniece, Manu. In part this was an effort to stay warm in the winter chill, but Gandhi soon acknowledged there was more to it: he was testing his vow of brahmacharya, or total chastity in thought and deed. If he could spend the night in a woman's embrace without feeling sexual stirrings, it would demonstrate that he had conquered his carnal impulses and become "God's eunuch." It turned out that Manu was not his first brahmacharya lab partner--he'd also recently gotten naked (partly, at least) with another young woman in his extended family, starting when she was 18.

There were quite a few raised eyebrows in India. One of the most vocal critics was Nirmal Kumar Bose, a university lecturer who served as Gandhi's interpreter in Noakhali. While conceding that no intercourse had taken place (Gandhi and his entourage typically all slept in the same room) Bose protested that the master was exploiting the women, each of whom felt she had a special place in his affections and became "hysterical" if slighted. (Refer the account by author Ved Mehta in his 1976 New Yorker series on Gandhi and his followers.) Gandhi, far from being abashed, vigorously defended himself in meetings, letters, and articles, arguing that making a woman "the instrument of my lust" would be far more exploitative than what he actually did.

Remarkably, the critics eventually quieted down. Even Bose, who quit in protest and later discussed the issue in a book, My Days With Gandhi, remained an admirer. Gandhi continued to sleep with women until his assassination in 1948, and the matter is little remembered today. The esteem in which Gandhi was held no doubt partly accounts for the lack of repercussions, along with his advanced age. His notoriously eccentric views on sex may have been a factor too. Gandhi believed that sex for pleasure was sinful (for that matter, he felt eating chocolate was sinful), that sexual attraction between men and women was unnatural, and that husband and wife should live together as brother and sister, having sex only for purposes of procreation."

While the sleeping fact has been noted in several literatures (so citation should not be a problem), the portion is much larger in volume than it probably deserves in the article. People with knowledge in this regard are requested to help. Regards.--Dwaipayan (talk) 18:08, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

I see that this text was deleted long ago [2] and there was no discussion about it. Do the long term editors here have any idea? --Knverma 13:38, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Wife beater?

Did Gandhi beat his wife?

Yes (I think) in the beginning. He had changed his attitude towards his wife and marriage in South Africa. Rama's arrow 03:18, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

He has never beaten his wife but shoved her as per his biography (Saraths 04:56, 15 November 2006 (UTC))

Both of these are technically true but misleading. They lived in a community where all labor was shared. On one occasion, he pushed her out of the house for refusing to take her turn in cleaning the communal toilets, for as she told him, "that is the work of untouchables".

[edit] A racist?

Yep. And he was a racist, too. A great man in many respects, but a racist. And, no, Rama's Arrow. Including such information in the article under "Criticism" is perfectly valid. It should not be obliterated with a dismissive edit note calling it "nonsense" -- as you have done. It is no different from dealing with Sally Hemmings and slavery in the article on Thomas Jefferson. Wikipedia is no place for censorship. No subject is sacrosanct. deeceevoice 15:59, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Please see WP:NPOV, WP:POINT, WP:CITE, WP:SOURCE, WP:RS. Editors have often discussed such claims before so you are also requested to check out the talkpage archives here. Rama's arrow 16:03, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

z The charges of racism are well known and completely valid. Don't quote wiki policy to me when you are clearly in violation of it. You oblitered accurate, relevant, adequately sourced information with a completely meaningless and dismissive (uncivil) edit note that in no way justified the edit. You have yet to offer any justification for removing the information. Why is it not relevant? And how is it "nonsense"? Finally, absolutely none of your nice, little links has any relevance whatsoever to the edits I've made. If anything, they apply to your behavior -- and not mine. Unless and until you can justify your deletion of the material, I will continue to insert it. deeceevoice 16:07, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Khalistan.com is a POV source. Please see WP:RS. Also I request you to see the talkpage archives here as I think this issue has been previously discussed numerous times. Rama's arrow 16:08, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Ah! A mere technicality. That's all you had to say, that the Khalitsan website is considered a POV source. Your unhelpful, disrespectful edit note gave no indication of the nature of your objection and -- again -- clearly is a violation of wiki policy. And that business about "disruption" is just bluster -- to use your word -- utter "nonsense." I'll be happy to provide the same information from a NPOV source, then, so you will have no credible objection -- because the historical record is clear: Gandhi was an anti-black bigot. deeceevoice 16:22, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

This resource must absolutely refer to Gandhi's outspoken hatred of black Africans. This is not eulogy, it's biography. Gandhi was no more a defender of human rights than, say, Farrakhan; he was defender of his own race against everyone else. Let's kill another modern myth. 86.17.209.251 20:07, 28 October 2006 (UTC)

PS As for evidence, just check Gandhi's own paper published in South Africa, Indian Opinion, in which he wrote of his racial beliefs "in four languages", writing at least a dozen columns inciting Indians in Africa to attack black Africans. Oh, and by the way, he also slept with young naked girls. 86.17.209.251 20:13, 28 October 2006 (UTC)

If you're going to argue this - in particular the 'slept with young naked girls' bit amongst others, you're going to have to back it up with some sort of evidence. Kitushi 21:15, 20 January 2007 (UTC)

This fact is well known. Read (Please experienced editors, this is the name of a book. I dont know how to make it a link) Freedom at Midnight - Dominique Lapierre and Larry Collins —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Milindsmart (talk • contribs) 11:38, 12 February 2007 (UTC).

Why isn't this covered in the article? There is even a book about how he viewed Sikhs, Untouchables, how he covered up the murder of Euro-American William Francis Doherty at the hands of Gandhi followers, and the aforementioned black South Africans. The book is called Gandhi: Behind the Mask of Divinity by G. B. Singh. Gandhi was also one of three different "saints," if you will, covered on Showtime Channel's Penn & Teller: Bullshit! (Holier Than Thou, episode 305 [Season 3, episode 5]. The two others were Mother Teresa and the Dalai Lama). There was even backlash of the unveiling of a Gandhi statue in Johannesburg, South Africa in October 2003. These criticisms should be included in the article, even with a rebuttal if there are any. You can read the following websites for more information: [3], [4], [5], [6], [7], [8], [9], [10], [11].

There are of course sensible rebuttals, that while he may have had ill-feelings towards black South Africans early in his life his views may have changed. People, including those highly revered, have the right to change their mind over time. [12] (look for Koryo's post second to the last post), [13] (the post by Anil Nauriya) -- WiccaIrish 15:29, 9 November 2006 (UTC) [updated 06:49, 10 November 2006 (UTC)]

any sources besides that G.B. singh guy? and a couple of those links (i did not read through them all) seem iffy...if this was a valid criticism, then wouldent there be more people out there besides that one author and articles attriubted to him? Maybe it would be good to list this criticism as being one from a particular source, specificallly that one author Pirus 03:43, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

Let's break this down, step by step, as this is becoming a major case of "he-said-she-said"...

Africans: Gandhi's statements about Africans can be interpreted in different ways. For example, the one where he was in prison with the African gentlemen who had been reduced to "one step removed from..." feral beasts, I think it was. Some use this to prove that Gandhi though all South Africans were feral beasts, although he may have just been describing the sorry state the prisoners were in. Also, keep in mind that the the meaning of "k*ffir" has changed over the years.

Singh: I googled "Gandhi racist blacks" and here were the results: Most of them had something to do with Gandhi's antiracism. Others had nothing to do with this particular Gandhi (It's a common name). The remaining ones that cited his so-called "racism" were usually interviews with this G.B. Singh person or internet forums citing his work. Curious, I ran a search on Singh, but could only find pictures of his book, a blurry photo of him, hideously biased interviews, and one guy on a forum claiming to have met him. It gets even weirder. I could not find even one objective and neutral biography of the man. That maketh me sur-spicious.

Jews:This has been discussed before. I hosestly can't tell where they're coming from here.

The Army: Some people use the fact that Gandhi was in the Army and fought Africans to "prove" he did not like them. Whuh? By this logic, US soldiers who fight Iraqi insurgents hate all Arabs.

In conclusion, whether or not you think Gandhi was racist depends on how one interprets what he said. Thank you. Belgium EO 22:18, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

P.S., I hosestly can't see how anyone could be anti-Gandhi. Don't they realize that means being anti-Martin Luther King and anti-Nelson Mandela (or at least, their philosophies). Singh calls Gandhi a "mad tyrant" and that trinicenter site says that he was a Nazi and that by encouraging Indians to join the Army during a time when they were fighting against blacks, then, logically (not), Gandhi wanted the Indians to wipe out the blacks. HUH? Belgium EO 02:13, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

There is an interesting dynamic that forms around a famously good person. Some people become set on discrediting him/her, and can say that anyone who disagrees is misinformed by the popular body of knowledge about the famous person, which is generally overwhelmingly good. However, often the people who are bent on discreditation are wrong, using POV sources, or POV themselves. Al e thiophile¹2₃ 21:26, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

I agree, this is especially true in the case of Gandhi. But you would also agree that there is some hesitation in discussing controversies concerning famously good persons. For whatever reasons, there was no response to my comments here. --Knverma 21:40, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Trimming bottom sections

Hi - my removal of data from the "legacy" section reflects 4 main concerns (a) this article is too long, (b) no need to list so many statues of Gandhi and (c) the films/video games etc. is all too new and overplayed in importance. "Gandhigiri" deserves one sentence - the rest belongs to the article on the film itself. Also (d) the film poster and postage stamps are to be used to describe the stamps/film in question, not Gandhi - this is a "fair use" issue. Rama's arrow 23:09, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

BTW postage stamps aren't a copyright issue: they're specifically excluded from copyright law. See below for a solution to the cultural material. Durova 18:30, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Cultural depictions of Mahatma Gandhi

I've started an approach that may apply to Wikipedia's Core Biography articles: creating a branching list page based on in popular culture information. I started that last year while I raised Joan of Arc to featured article when I created Cultural depictions of Joan of Arc, which has become a featured list. Recently I also created Cultural depictions of Alexander the Great out of material that had been deleted from the biography article. Since cultural references sometimes get deleted without discussion, I'd like to suggest this approach as a model for the editors here. Regards, Durova 18:30, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Article Misnamed

Shouldn't the article use his real name, instead of his nickname? 24.227.116.226 03:59, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

Mahatma is a title, not a nickname. Jachra 01:20, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

This article is clearly misnamed. Yes, Mahatma is not a nickname, but it is also not a title. It is an honorific given to him by those who revered him. I personally happen to agree with those people, but my personal opinion (and yours) is irrelevant. It is clearly an honorific and is therefore not NPOV. It should not be used in the title of the article.

Going further, the page about Bill Clinton is not President Clinton and the page about Martin Luther King, Jr. is not Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. or Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King, Jr., both of which will just get error pages on Wikipedia. Just like President Clinton and William Jefferson Clinton redirect to Bill Clinton, Mahatma Gandhi should redirect to Mohandas Gandhi. But the page title should be his name, just like everybody else on Wikipedia. --anon 01/19/2007

Agreed. Let's move it if there are no justified objections. Ahudson 16:34, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

See also this page: Talk:Mahatma Gandhi/Mahatma_vs._Mohandas. Note that the title of this section is "Article Misnamed," not "Change Mahatma to Mohandas everywhere it appears on Wikipedia." The latter is just silly. On that talk page people argued that Mahatma Gandhi is like Mother Teresa. That is not an accurate comparison. Mother Teresa is like Pope John Paul II. Mother and Pope are titles, not honorifics. We should leave all the text asis and simply rename the page. If you disagree, let's rename the Harry Houdini page to be The Great Houdini (and not only does the latter not link to Houdini's page, it links to some other page, about an obscure book published 55 years ago) and the James Randi page to The Amazing Randi. Once you start down the slippery slope of using non-names, where do you stop? --anon 01/19/2007

So who decides? Either this page becomes Mohandas or we have a very large list of other pages that we have to rename. To name a few:

William the Conquerer (or William of Normandy, if you prefer, but not William I of England -- nobody calls him that!)
Peter the Great
Ivan the Terrible
The Great Houdini
The Amazing Randi
Chairman Mao
Le General (Charles de Gaulle)
The King (Elvis, of course)
The Greatest (Muhammad Ali)
The Great One (Wayne Gretzky or Jackie Gleason -- we can flip a coin)

There seems to be a consensus on both this and the archived discussion page that the man's name should be the page name, and a small number of people arguing otherwise. A number of people have said it is not NPOV to name the page Mahatma. If a sizable number of people feel the title is an honorific, these people are right that it is not NPOV, even if there are some people for whom, personally, it is not an honor. You might discount one person's opinion, but you have multiple people's opinions here. Let's respect those opinions.

Use redirections --vineeth

That misses the point. You should read the prior discussion before responding. The redirect should be from Mahatma Gandhi to Mohandas Gandhi, just like there is a redirect from William the Conquerer, the common term, to William I of England, the official name of the page and a name that virtually nobody uses to refer to the guy. Mohandas is his name. Mahatma isn't -- it is Sanskrit for "Great Soul"... (read more at Mahatma).

There are two clear choices. 1) Leave this page and rename many other pages to use the most common name for the person as the page name, or 2) rename this page to use Mohandas Gandhi's real name (perhaps with his middle initial, as the convention elsewhere). Is there anyone with a clear argument for leaving this page and renaming the pages listed above (and probably many others)? If you have such an argument, now is the time to step forward.

[edit] Truth is God and Faith in God.

Gandhi was not awarded Noble Prize. Is there any relation between Truth, God and Noble Prize? vkvora 14:43, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

Maybe racist reasons why he never got it. But also he himself was extremely racist against Africans. Also, various people, including Freud, accused him of pedophilia.. which, as you mentioned it, has its own rather substantial relationship with men of god.. maybe more in christianity and islam than hinduism, which is more open sexually, but never underestimate the perversions of the powerful. JeffBurdges 10:10, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

Few years back letters were published regarding why he did not get a noble prize. He was nominated three times I believe and the third time he was going to be awarded but he died by then. Previous two times his nomination was rejected because of a combination of various reasons such as 1) Their were some violent incidents that came up during the freedom movement and the committee was unable to differentiate between the two and 2) The usual systematic bias that takes place when the entire committee consists of people from one region. --Blacksun 18:21, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

I fail to see what you're trying to point out Vkorva2001. This is a bibliographical entry on Ghandi thus must contain as many aspects of him so it should contain his Beliefs and his Legacy which I think are both important. And why does everyone feel the need to say the same argument over and over again, he's a pedophile/racist. Good for him, if you can't think of a real argument against putting the information displayed here then just shut up. Such fallacious arguments are simply a waste of time to read. --Guruparan 03:35, 17 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Toilet stuff missing from Principles

As I understand it, Gandhi wrote extensively about excrement, latrine cleaning, and enemas (cute quote "The bathroom is a temple. It should be so clean and inviting that anyone would enjoy eating there"). Can anyone who knows about such writings add a subsection to principles? JeffBurdges 10:04, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Gandhi Humor

I simply can't resist sharing this gem with my fellow Wikipedians:

Mahatma Gandhi spent much of his life walking barefoot, and he developed as a result an impressive set of calluses. He was also renowned for his ascetic diet, which while vegetarian and earth-friendly, combined with his frequent fasting to leave him less than hale and hearty. His diet also contributed to poor oral hygiene, and led to – let's be kind – “gingivitis”.

All in all, this made him ...

a super-calloused, fragile mystic hexed by halitosis.

Sorry, but this non-encyclopedic pun (compound homophony?) was just too good for me not to share it! Groans, appreciative and otherwise, may be posted on my talk page. --Eliyahu S ^Talk 12:09, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

Ha ha ha! I got a kick out of that, Eliyahu! --pie4all88 07:59, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] All this was mainly done to raise the status of India's depressed classes and draw them into the freedom struggle.

Can we really speak to Gandhi's motivation for leading his life in such a manner? If there is a legitimate source for this claim then obviously its fine, but if it is simply speculation, however well founded, it should be removed.Trojan traveler 00:19, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Secret Atheism and sexual promiscuity?

I read in A.J. Jacobs' novel The Know-It-All: One Man's Humble Quest to Become the Smartest Person in the World (good book; read it) that Gandhi practiced secret atheism and was at least a little sexually promiscuous in his youth before he fully embraced religion and a life of being good. I didn't see any of this in the article, and I don't have the book on me at the moment so I can't make sure my memory isn't fooling me, so I thought I'd run it past people on the discussion page before it got included in the article. The Know-It-All has a second-hand account of Gandhi's life (the facts are taken from the Encyclopedia Britannica) so that can probably be used as a reference. If you back these claims, please feel free to edit the article accordingly. Thanks! --pie4all88 07:59, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

Well, Gandhi nowhere mentions about secret atheism in his autobiography, but yes he does admit that because of the bad company during childhood days he consumed meat and landed with a brothel, but no such bad thing happened, more details here. He does admit of his carnal lust during his teen days here. I suggest you to read the The Story of My Experiments with Truth, he does not hide anything in this book, but I feel that claiming gandhi to be sexually promiscuous is simply blowing things out of proportion. Having said all these, he completely becomes a celibate later on... --vineeth 11:51, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

The autobiography page linked above gives no evidence whatsoever of sexual promiscuity. We must remember that this is his private thoughts, and thoughts are not promiscuity. The article, to be clear, tells a story of Gandhi wanting to have sex with his wife while massaging his sick father's feet every night, and then feeling guilty when his father died after he had gone to his wife and waken her up. Besides that, even the thoughts acted out are not promiscuity. Having sex is not promiscuity, especially with your marriage partner, and your father dying does not make it any more so. Moreover, this all seems like perfectly normal behavior to me, and may even be evidence of a LACK of promiscuity.

Ah, thanks a lot for the response, vineeth. --pie4all88 13:32, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Mahatma Gandhi on the Bhagavadgita

GITA ACCORDING TO GANDHI I think this to be important for the mainpage.

Austerlitz 88.72.14.143 18:55, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

Thank you for mentioning this wonderful commentary. I have a copy of the Desai edition of it and will add a mention of it in the main article. Buddhipriya 06:04, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

Wikisource has original text related to this article:

The Story of My Experiments with Truth

Hey, wats up ppl. Gandhi is a great leader. Isn't Gandhi suppose to be spelled like Ghandi.—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 69.121.67.169 (talk • contribs). loser lol

Its Gandhi, not Ghandi. Shahab 16:00, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Motion to add in sentence within Gandhi's Principles "and ends" after the word extremes

Theresanother 12:48, 22 December 2006 (UTC)It's my personal opinion that the sentence "applying these principles, Gandhi did not balk from taking them to their most logical extremes" could be mistaken in ways that do not accurately demonstrate Gandhi's character. Therefore, I request that we add "and ends" after the word "extremes."Theresanother 12:48, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Plagiarism

Some of the text has been copied and pasted from this website:

http://www.arikah.com/encyclopedia/Mahatma_Gandhi

Most Notibly the Photograph from 1899 of Ghandi in the Ambulance Corps is Plagiarized.

I also Found some Plagiarized text from this page too:

http://www.hindu.com/mag/2005/10/23/stories/2005102300210300.htm

--Wiki Bender 04:29, 25 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] God?

Why does the last part of the intro saying that his teachings inspired civil rights leaders include God?

Terrifying Angel 23:04, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Struggle for Indian Independence

I have added citation requests on the following sentences:

"As he had done in the South African War, Gandhi urged support of the British in World War I and was active in encouraging Indians to join the army."
"His rationale, opposed by many others, was that if he desired the full citizenship, freedoms and rights in the Empire, it would be wrong not to help in its defence."

Is this true? If so, he certainly changed his opinion before and during World War II. nirvana2013 12:53, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Yes, this is true, it is in his autobiography; you're right, though, it should be appropiately cited. 132.216.13.4 09:50, 24 January 2007 (UTC) Brendon

[edit] Gandhi was an anarchist

Gandhi was an anarchist! He wanted to build a stateless society in India after its independence. See: http://calpeacepower.org/0201/PDF/was_gandhi_an_anarchist.pdf Shahab 16:27, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I agree. His vision was very similar to Christian anarchism. nirvana2013 13:58, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] External links

I came here to remove a link from a spammer I've been chasing and was bit surprised to see the state of them on a featured article. Both the external links section the ones under "see also" seem to have got out of hand. I would put up a {{external links}} tag, but since this is an FAs thought a request here might be a better approach. Is anyone up for reviewing them? -- Siobhan Hansa 17:19, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Mahatma

The term Mahatma was one that Gandhi was not fond of as he felt it placed him above the rest, perhaps Mahatma Gandhi should redirect to Gandhi and Gandhi contain this article, especially as Gandhi is shorter and thus easier to find.

Gotskills22 02:52, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

There are many people with the name Ghandi, and so it would not be correct to move this article there. As someone said earlier in the talk page, Mahatma is a title; however, none of the other biographies have their title in the article title, so I don't know what's going on here.

Along that vein, I propose that we move this page to Mohandas K. Gandhi, and turn this into a redirect. Any objections? Ahudson 22:12, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Error of Fact

In line no. 27 it has been qouted that the Dandi March was an open call for the British to quit India in the year 1942. According to my knowledge the Dandi March started the Civil Disobedience and took place in 1929.I sincerely hope that the editor will take notice of this error and correct it immediately.

--Kartikeyrinwa 14:27, 12 January 2007 (UTC)Kartikey

Actually, the main article on that says it was in 1930 (see Salt Satyagraha). I'll review that article and correct this section as needed. Ahudson 22:18, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

i don't know who wrote that but i think its a bit wierd considering the good gandhi did, it doesn't really matter if he was transsexual or not so i think maybe you could include some of his work like making the salt etc. for people looking for information

[edit] Importance of journalists and Ghandi's embrace of journalism in his movement

I should preface this post by saying that I don't know much about Ghandi. Before I saw the 1982 film I knew only that he was important in the India independence movement, believed in non-violent resistance, and fasted a lot. Something that I noticed in the movie was the importance of journalists and news in his movement. He seems to have published some sort of journal??? and embraced journalists of all stripes---and I have no doubt they were instrumental in the success of his movement.

I am suggesting a short mention of his use of the press at least in the South African section. I think that it is worthy of inclusion because of its importance in the success and widespread effectiveness of his movement.

Madison Underwood madisonu@gmail.com 4:29 AM Jan 18 2007

[edit] Language pettiness

Could we swap the “alternate name” in the summary box to “alternative name”? I know Americans struggle with these two, but still, it would look better. 88.110.97.3 17:21, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Infobox

In the infobox, why is the native name in Hindi and not Gujarati? --Wolf^talk 19:19, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Assassination question

There is a paragraph at the end of the section on his assassination that doesn't make any sense to me:

Bharat owed to Pakistan a debt of 55 Crores whereas Pakistan owed to Bharat a debt of Rs. 300 Crores. Government had already decided to recover Rs. 245 Crores from Pakistan. Gandhi began a fast unto death and made Pakistan free of debt of Rs. 245 crores it owed to India on the basis of which, Pakistan managed to attack Kashmir for the first time after Independence! Nathuram Godse then slayed Gandhi on 30th January. Shri Ram Manohar Lohiya said, "Nathuram's way was wrong, yet the reasons for his agitation were right and factual. The egos of leaders especially those of Mahatma's are terrible!" The interesting point to note is that Nathuram Godse was himself a Satyagrahi and an ardent follower of Gandhi's Harijan seva. He had actively participated in inter-caste Marriage and functions of Dalits. He was in short a Satyagrahi and a Dalit Activist.[17]

I don't know much about this subject, so I'll leave it to the more knowledgeable to render an agreement. I just wanted to point out something that seems really out of place.

 feb. 23, 2007

The page linked to is severely POV and in any case the information about his assasin should be on its own page. I am removing this until someone can add a more authoritative source for the Rs. 245 Crore claim. I might add that using "Bharat" when discussing India in English is very bad form. I am reverting. Viz 23:26, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Did Gandhi lead campaigns for "the increase of poverty, the imprisonment of women..."? This seems to be vandalism that has been missed. --naryathegreat | (talk) 22:55, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] about 3rd para of Early life section

The age 8 years mentioned in 3rd para of "Early life" section is to be changed to 18 years. 195.150.224.71 00:40, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] criticism

i'd like to add an external link but the article is locked. i would like to have an inter-page link from the criticism section to the external link. can anyone tell me why the page is locked to me? anyway, here is the link: http://history.eserver.org/ghandi-nobody-knows.txt i hope someone else will be able to link this article with the wiki article. the article is a very worthwhile read and well written. i'll be damned if the writing style fooled me into thinking it's all true without being so--it's so authoritatively and well written. an amazing article of criticism 69.105.39.16 20:16, 12 March 2007 (UTC)jj 3/12/07

[edit] Woven with a charkha? No.

"Making his own clothes—the traditional Indian dhoti and shawl woven with a charkha, he lived on a simple vegetarian diet." -- Um, one spins with a charkha. One weaves with a loom. -- Writtenonsand 00:46, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

Correct. However using handlooms Khadi was also manufactured in Gandhiji's ashrams although it is unclear if Gandhiji himself played a part. See this link.--Shahab 18:08, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

Sure. Just clarifying the vocabulary. :-). -- Writtenonsand 16:08, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Fake Photos

Some of the photos of Ghandi when he was younger on this page look like fakes. Where are they from?

What pictures do you mean specifically?--Shahab 18:59, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

i have a question. what kind of technology was available to ghandi in his time period?

74.128.172.184 23:02, 25 March 2007 (UTC)andy

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