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Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (; 2 October 1869 - 30 January 1948) was an Indian lawyer, anti-colonial nationalist, and political ethicist, who employed nonviolent resistance to lead the successful campaign for India's independence from British rule, and in turn inspired movements for civil rights and freedom across the world.

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The Gandhi Rap - be the change u want to see

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A video that I made for speech class on how Gandhi impacts us today. Created freshman year in highschool. Information gathered on Wikipedia.

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Mahatma Gandhi was an international symbol for human rights whose personal dedication to nonviolent resistance inspired generations. Find out more about his

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Sixty years after his death, Mahatma Gandhi is still a major presence on the world stage.

Since his assassination on Jan. 30, 1948, at the hands of a Hindu extremist, Gandhi has had a global impact.

To start with the United States, Gandhi influenced two of the most important mass mobilizations in this country - the civil-rights struggle for equality for African-Americans and Cesar Chavez's advocacy for Latino farmworkers.

"Gandhi was probably the first person in history to lift the love ethic of Jesus above mere interaction between individuals to a powerful and effective social force on a large scale," King remarked. It is not for nothing that a section of the Martin Luther King Center in Atlanta deals with Gandhi.

But the influence of Gandhi on the civil-rights movement predated King. African-American leaders such as Howard Thurman and Benjamin Mays undertook long voyages to India on ocean steamers to meet Gandhi, while W.E.B. Du Bois corresponded with him. King was himself introduced to Gandhi's vision by African-American Gandhians such as Mordecai Johnson and Bayard Rustin.

Gandhi had a great effect on Chavez, too. Chavez traced his political awakening to a newsreel he saw at the age of 11 or 12 showing that "this half-naked man without a gun had conquered the might of the British Empire." Chavez modeled many of his tactics on Gandhi, from boycotts to hunger strikes. "Not only did he talk about nonviolence, he showed how nonviolence works for justice and liberation," Chavez

said.

Outside the United States, Gandhi has had a similar effect. Nelson Mandela, the Dalai Lama, imprisoned Burmese Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, Guatemalan Nobel Peace Prize-winner Rigoberta Menchu - all these giants of our time have acknowledged Gandhi as a guiding light.

Gandhi's vision helped inspired movements that toppled dictators from Ferdinand Marcos in the Philippines in 1986 and Augusto Pinochet in Chile in 1989 to the Communist regimes in Eastern Europe in the late 1980s and Slobodan Milosevic in Yugoslavia in 2000.

Gandhi also made a big impact on the Muslim world.

During Gandhi's lifetime, a good friend of his, Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, founded a movement for nonviolence and social reform among the Pashtuns on the border of current-day Pakistan and Afghanistan that had at its height more than 100,000 adherents. In the 1990s, Ibrahim Rugova led a movement for independence in Kosovo that drew inspiration from Gandhi. And several activists in Palestine have adopted Gandhi's message to offer nonviolent ways of resisting Israeli occupation.

But so much more needs to be done.

The world is torn by strife, caught between states that are too eager to use force and guerrilla armies drawn to the fatal lure of violence. The planet's sole superpower has sent a terrible message to the world by engaging in a devastating preemptive war in Iraq. The nihilistic, ultraviolent philosophy of Al Qaeda has tainted the image of an entire region and religion. And in Africa, violence in the pursuit of cynical political ends scars the lives of millions from Darfur to the Congo.

Gandhi understood that his vision of nonviolence had mass appeal, and that his own leadership was of lesser importance. Gandhi himself said, "There go my people; I must run to catch up with them for I am their leader."

More than half a century after Gandhi's death, we need more leaders who want to catch up with nonviolent people.

Amitabh Pal is the co-editor of the Progressive Media Project and the managing editor of The Progressive magazine in Madison, Wis. He is working on a book about the role of nonviolence in Islam. He can be reached at pmproj@progressive.org.

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60 years after death, Gandhi is making world a better place

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Sixty years after his death, Mahatma Gandhi is still a major presence on the world stage. Since his assassination on Jan. 30, 1948, at the hands of a Hindu extremist, Gandhi has had a global impact.

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A brief description abour Gandhi's life, his qualities as a leader and other stuff...

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Gandhi found extreme poverty and famine in his country, so he decided to clean up the area build schools and hospitals.

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Each Monday, this column turns a page in history to explore the discoveries, events and people that continue to affect the history being made today.

He wasn't the first, nor would he be the last, but the wiry, bespectacled man from Gujarat is certainly the most famous of the world's peaceful political dissidents.

Mohandas Gandhi - also affectionately known as Mahatma - led India's independence movement in the 1930s and 40s by speaking softly without carrying much of a big stick, facing down the British colonialists with stirring speeches and non-violent protest. For his troubles, he's often named among the 20th century's most important figures and remains revered in India as a father of the nation.

More than anything else, historians say, Gandhi proved that one man has the power to take on an empire, using both ethics and intelligence. Other peaceful resisters such as Martin Luther King Jr. during the 1960s civil rights movement and Tibet's Dalai Lama have emulated his methods in years since, shaking up the dynamic of world politics in the process.

Urges Britain to quit India

It is hard to imagine the thin, robed Gandhi working in the rough and tumble world of law, but Gandhi did get his start in politics as a lawyer in South Africa, where he supported the local Indian community's struggle for civil rights. Returning to India in 1915, he carried over his desire to improve the station of the lower classes.

Gandhi quickly became a leader within the Indian National Congress, a growing political party supporting independence, and traveled widely with the party to learn about the local struggles of various Indian communities.

It was during those travels that his legend grew among the Indian people, historians say.

Finding extreme poverty and famine in his own Gujarat province, Gandhi led an initiative to clean up the area, install new schools and build hospitals. He was ultimately arrested by British-appointed landlords for causing unrest, but talked his way out of jail and negotiated better conditions for the Indian farmers. When news about this sneaky feat spread through India, he earned the nickname "Bapu" - or Father.

Indeed, Gandhi was known as much for his wit and intelligence as for his piety. When he was arrested several more times over the years for his actions during the movement, Gandhi calmly fasted in prison, believing that his death would embarrass the British enough to spur independence, which had become the focus of his politics by 1920.

Gandhi's non-cooperation movement, kicked off in the early 1920s, called for Indians to boycott British goods and traditions and become self-reliant. His most famous protest came in 1930, when Gandhi led thousands of Indians on a 250-mile march to a coastal town to produce salt, on which the British had a monopoly.

Inspires civil rights

India finally gained full independence in 1947 when Gandhi was 78. Although some historians argue that independence was inevitable with Britain's economic collapse after World War II, most agree that it would not have happened without the foundation of dissent he built among several hundred million Indians throughout the 1920s and 30s.

Ironically, the ultimate proponent of non-violence was killed by assassination in 1948 while walking to his evening prayer meeting.

Today, Indians, anti-war protestors and authors, for the many interesting quotes he provided, celebrate Gandhi as a preeminent figure. Not 20 years after his death, Gandhi also had a direct impact on the history of the United States.

Martin Luther King Jr. is said to be have been heavily influenced by Gandhi's philosophy of non-violence, believing it to be the only logical approach to the problem of race relations in America.

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Each Monday, this column turns a page in history to explore the discoveries, events and people that continue to affect the history being made today. He wasn't the first, nor would he be the last, but the wiry, bespectacled man from Gujarat is certainly the most famous of the world's peaceful political dissidents.

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Renunciation. Gandhi gave up many of his possessions to devote himself to his country (India).
EXAMPLE: Gandhi gave up western clothing for traditional Indian clothing to promote his country.

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In religion, renunciation often indicates an abandonment of pursuit of material comforts, in the interests of achieving spiritual enlightenment. In Hinduism, the renounced order of life is ; in Buddhism, the Pali word for "renunciation" is , conveying more specifically "giving up the world and leading a holy life" or "freedom from lust, craving and desires."

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Non violence, Gandhi did not believe in violence to get his way.
EXAMPLE: he used petitions to get his word across
LINK:https://youtu.be/WW3uk95VGes

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"One has to speak out and stand up for one's convictions. Inaction at a time of conflagration is inexcusable."--Mahatma GandhiThe basic principles of Gandhi's philosophy of non-violence (Ahimsa) and non-violent action (Satyagraha)were chosen by Thomas Merton for this volume in 1965.