Ten Thousand Things
Multicultural Webfinds

"Ten Thousand Things" is a Buddhist expression representing the dynamic interconnection and simultaneous unity and diversity of everything in the universe.

Renewing Gandhigiri Action – How Gandhi Got His Mojo Back

I loved these two articles – social activist Mihir Shah's lucid "Gandhigiri: A Philosophy for our Times," published at Hinduonnet.org and U Mass-Amherst political science student Swati Gauri Sharma's witty and insightful "How Gandhi Got His Mojo Back," published at Common Dreams:

In India and the West, the legacies and teachings of prominent historical figures are all too often lost among pop culture, new technology, and the media. But a new hit movie in India has somehow managed to make Indians shift their focus from Brad Pitt, who is adored there, to the most important figure in modern Indian history – Gandhi.

Gandhi's sudden popularity among all ages and cultures in India brings to an end a long period in which his fame and influence had faded. While Hollywood holds a similar significance in people's lives as Mumbai-based Bollywood, the most popular branch of the Indian film industry, and has more money, resources, and global reach, it has not been able to create the same kind of response as Bollywood was able to generate for a historical figure.

Until August, when a comedy with Gandhi as a central figure was released all over India, most of the people who spoke about Gandhi and his values were alive when he was shot in 1948. Now, all generations have re-embraced the father, or "Bapu," of the nation.

In the movie, titled "Lage Raho Munna Bhai," gangster Munna Bhai meets Gandhi and instead of indulging in his usual ``dadagiri," meaning bullying, he endorses Gandhi's teachings of non-violence and battles with his enemy by giving him flowers, rather than punches.

"Gandhigiri," a term coined by the movie and a play on the word "dadagiri," means to use moral force and kindness to make a point or fight injustice. College students in Lukhnow, who in the past held many violent protests, decided this year to practice ``Gandhigiri" and pass out flowers instead of screaming angry words. On a smaller level, Reuters India reported that a girl, Shweta Polanki, broke up with her boyfriend when he made whistling noises to get the attention of a waiter, a gesture that is belittling and disrespectful, according to ``Gandhigiri..."

A reawakening was necessary because before this film, the man whose picture is on many major public buildings and on India's currency was in danger of being forgotten. In the face of India's unprecedented technological growth, nuclear arms, and the growing influence of Western culture, Gandhi's relevance had slowly dissipated. Adding to that was the effort of Congress's rival party, Bharatiya Janata, which ruled from 1998 to 2004, to lower the significance of Gandhi, who was a Congress stalwart. This movie made it possible for people to let go of their party loyalties and simply focus on Gandhi's teachings.

Shah elucidates the principles of Gandhian nonviolent action:

The use of the term Gandhigiri highlights the fact that in an unjust world, change necessitates the use of force. It also emphasises that Gandhiji stood for action in the face of oppression. Not passive contemplation or individual salvation. That is why Gandhigiri appeals to Munnabhai in the first place.

But Gandhigiri's use of force speaks of a completely new kind of politics for our time. It poses a radical challenge to the language and idiom of the many movements for social change, whether Marxist or Feminist or those fighting race, caste, ethnic, religious or imperialist oppression. Gandhigiri insists that in our fight we must not remain imprisoned in the "victim" mode. Those suffering injustice are not completely constituted by their affliction. Their identity is beyond that constructed for them by their oppressor. But the dehumanising experience of pain and the utter obduracy of their persecutor appear to push them, with an apparent historical inevitability, into the language of the tormentor. This creates the danger of an infinite regress of violence and counter-violence. As evidenced in so many parts of the world today, such as the Middle East. Gandhigiri affirms that those suffering have an existence that transcends their victimisation. If they are to genuinely work for liberation, they need to espouse a truly transformational language. This is very difficult as Gandhiji repeatedly says in the film. It requires incredible internal strength that is not easy to muster or demand. But Gandhigiri consists in speaking to the other not in the language of contemptuous anger and hate but of forgiveness, compassion, and humility.

Most ideologies of the oppressed contain the danger that they will only end up reinforcing the divisions they sought to fight against. History is replete with such examples.

So much work in the name of the oppressed has only ended up reinforcing divisiveness. Gandhigiri says we must oppose the oppressors. But it adds that if we want real change that unites rather than divides, we need to find a new way to oppose those we must. We need to spell out a common basis for those who are on opposite sides today to ultimately agree to work upon. That way outlined again and again by the many prophets and messengers (who were all social revolutionaries of their own era) has to be founded on an understanding of the possibility that we may even be wrong, that we need to keep learning, that we must keep trying to reach out to the other with openness and love. The path is, therefore, one of ceaseless creativity and imagination, continuous self-critical re-examination...

Being against division does not mean an obliteration of differences. It means precisely the opposite, in fact. We celebrate difference. As Gandhiji did in his multi-faith prayer meetings. As Swami Vivekananda did when he proclaimed that the book of God is ever being written. Our path must speak of a mutual respect for all beings and paths. But the respect has to be mutual. The way Munnabhai advises Lucky Singh's daughter to see her father in the dramatic climax of the film, is a powerful evocation of the common message of all spiritual traditions — in the words of the veteran Gandhian Satish Kumar — "you are, therefore, I am." An affirmation of the inextricable interconnectedness of all beings that the Buddha so powerfully explains. Recognition of this interconnectedness necessitates a giving up of the vocabulary and grammar of non-negotiable opposition. The Lithuanian Talmudic Emmanuel Levinas (whose centennial is being celebrated this year) would go as far as to say that an ethics of transcendence must affirm the primacy of the other.

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