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RELEVENCE OF MORALITY IN GANDHIAN

PHILOSOPHY

V.D. PARASHAR1 and DR RITA DEVI SINGH2

1
Assistant Professor in Political Science
2
Associate Professor in Sociology

Government P.G. College, Dholpur (Raj.)

Abstract
Mahatma Gandhi has not created any new philosophy in fact but the philosophical basis of his ideas is
called Gandhi-Darshan. Gandhiji's entire political or social life is awash with spirituality. His entire life
has been involved in the spiritual advancement of humanity. Gandhiji had an unwavering faith in God.
He considered God as a 'living force' and said that our life is governed by that power. In Gandhiji's own
words - "There is no such thing beyond the description of God Which can be felt but can’t be known in
the life”. By defining truth as God, Gandhiji gave comprehensiveness to the concept of truth and
included many characteristics of God such as likeness, morality, justice, non-violence and love".

Key words- Gandhi-philosophy, Divinity, Spiritualization, Trusteeship, Minimum State,

Machiavellian-Politics, Colonialism, Extremism, Untouchability.

The basis of the moral philosophy of Gandhiji is that each and every
human has essential godliness itself and every particle of nature contains the consciousness of God, so
no human being can be hundred percent evil, the need is to highlight that superior part in the human
soul. Therefore, Gandhiji never separated God from humanity. By expanding the meaning of the word
God, he gave a new notion “Daridranarayana”, which means 'Lord of the poor'. By the mantra of “Nar
Seva, Narayan Seva” Gandhiji humanized God and gave a new vision and new direction to the entire
humanity. Gandhiji accepted the true authority of God, saying that accepting God in life is the true
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religion. Religion and morality are monogamous terms and the both are so intertwined that can’t be
separated from each other. Religion is the prerequisite of morality. Morality is the ally of religion. All
religions have the same moral basis and “Vishvadharma” will be the appropriate word for the term
religion. Mahatma Gandhi said that we needn’t to go to any mountain peak to worship the god and
religion. The religion should be expressed through our work in society.
In Gandhian philosophy, the basic principles of morality are truth and
non-violence. Gandhiji considered absolute truth to be synonymous with God. The revelation of his
deep faith in god can be cleared from one instance of his autobiography “When a foreign insurance
agent came to visit me in Bombay, he spoke with me about my future interests in such a way as he was
an old friend. He said that everybody in your situation should have an insured life. You should also
become relaxed about the future by doing this. There is no faith of life. Even in America, we regard the
insurance as a religion. Can’t I tempt you to take a small policy”? After getting that insurance of ten
thousand rupees, Gandhi felt that he had expressed disbelief in God. Gandhiji's entire life was based on
truth. He never compromised to truth. The main reason for abandoning profession of lawyer was that
there was no way to go through without lies and deceit.
Giving a wider meaning to non-violence, Gandhiji considered non-violence a
major mean of attaining truth. Gandhiji wrote in his book Hind Swaraj - "If the story of the world
started with a fight, not a single person would be alive today, but so many in the world People are still
alive, it tells that the basis of the world is truth, compassion and self-strength rather than physical force.
"In the above example, Gandhiji showed the importance of non-violence. He considered love and non-
violence as the preconditions of the history of human development. For Gandhi, non-violence is not
only a philosophy but a method and technique of heart-changing. To search for the truth, it is necessary
to be ethical and it can be done only by means of non-violence. For Gandhi, non-violence is a symbol of
supreme moral and spiritual power. Mahatma Gandhi enlightened not only India but the whole world
with the idea of morality. Gandhiji not only showed the path to achieve national independence but also
provided an environment in which a common man can develop his qualities and achieve manhood. He
didn’t want freedom at the cost of violence, bloodshed, untruth and deceit because he knew that
freedom without morality has no value.
If we look at the world today, we see that the world is full of problems. Although
political colonialism has been eliminated from the world, it has been replaced by economic colonialism.
Developed nations and their multinational companies are exploiting developing nations using new
tactics. The nexus of the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, and the World Trade
Organization, which are promoting multinationals and their empire expansion, are being weighed down
on the weak nations whose feet are still faltering. Basically, the basic condition of the development of

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Gandhiji is that man should become self-reliant with self-strength and fulfill his own needs on the basis
of internal resources. Gandhi's life philosophy reflects a limited need. He was opposed to external
things precisely because we can be subdued if external powers exceed a limit.
At the moment the entire world is struggling with environmental problems.
The main reason for this is the involvement of countries in the indiscriminate exploitation of resources
and the blind race for material development. Gandhi used to say that nature gives us so much that the
needs of the whole world can be fulfilled, but the greed of a single person cannot be fulfilled. Today
there is a need that we should redefine development, moving away from the world of modern
materialism.
Nowadays the present world is in the grip of terrorism and fanaticism. Extremist
elements are raising their heads in all Islamic and non-Islamic nations and have become cancerous for
the whole of humanity. At this time Gandhiji comes to our mind that if the system based on the truth
and non-violence proposed by him is established today, peace can be established all over the world.

Today if we look at our national problems, many political, economic, social,

problems exist. Indian politics and politicians today appear to be devoid of values and morality. If the
politician considers his sense of duty and considers politics as the medium of public service, then our
problems will be lost. Gandhiji wanted to modernize politics. He said, "Politics, isolated from Religion
is meaningless. Politics means activism for the welfare of the people. "Today, in the name of public
welfare, the state is becoming stronger with the increase in the work areas of the state and its
empowerment is causing problems and the state is behaving unethically. From a Gandhian point of
view, he considered the state as an instrument and was in favor of minimizing its scope as a person can
solve his problems only by being self-reliant. The state is a symbol of organized violence, so it is
necessary that the work area of the state should be minimized and decentralized. The charkha
symbolizes the decentralization of Gandhiji.
These days humanity is constantly struggling with new health related
problems. Gandhi wanted to follow the principle of physical labor for earning bred. he said once that
the desire of nature is that human must eat after hard work. If everybody has physical labor in his
routine life, then many health related issues would have gone into the background.
The economy of the entire world goes through a phase of ups and downs. A
wall of economic inequality stands between various countries. Today the number of the poor is
increasing and the wealth of the rich is increasing. In Gandhiji's words, "India needn't to end morality in
the materialistic race like the countries of America and Europe ". Gandhi didn't like the giant chimneys
and factories, standing on dead bodies of Men, women and children. According to him, as the economic

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prosperity of the countries is increasing, the level of morality is decreasing day by day. Unemployment
is due to industrialization of definite form and mass mechanization. Gandhiji opposed mechanization.
The solution of the above mentioned modern economic problems can be found
in Gandhi's economic ideas. According to him, the priority of economics should be ethics. Truth and
non-violence should be implemented in the economic sector. The basis of Gandhiji's economic ideas is
moral and spiritual, he considers meaning as a mean.His views on trusteeship are called idealistic, but
for a moment, if you believe that the wealth is a liability to the society, then the whole world will be
transformed in an instant. In the words of Gandhiji, "All the wealth of the world belongs to God and if
anyone has more wealth than the proportion, he is the trustee of that wealth". Certainly the relevance of
Gandhiji's economic theory is self-proved. Gandhiji said that the economy which strikes the moral
welfare of a person or a nation is immoral and therefore sinful. He further said that the biggest
drawback of the economy is that the rich people earn huge wealth by exploiting the poor and the
relationship between the owner and the servant gets worse day by day.
At present humanity is facing a lot of social issues. If we try to solve these
problems, then we will definitely find that Gandhiji is there to show the path. He thought about many
social problems of the time and emphasized over the solution.Gandhi said that untouchability is a mite
who is making void to the Hindu society. Gandhi was deeply saddened by the misery of women and in
his thinking he made it clear that women are not inferior to men in any area. He advocated to give equal
rights and freedom to women as men. Hitting out the veil system, he said that the purity of the character
cannot come from the veil. It is a matter related to conscience. In Gandhiji's own words, "a man is born
of a woman, his flesh is made of a woman's flesh and a bone is made of a woman's bone". Gandhi also
advocated for widow-marriage.
The education philosophy of Gandhiji is quite valuable today. The main problem
before today's education system is that it has not been successful in character building of students. It is
necessary for a nation to have citizens with high qualities of morality, whether their factual knowledge
is relatively low. According to Gandhiji, education is a broad concept.its primary basis is spiritual and
the aims of education are to integrate body, mind and soul.
In the present era, humanity is under the shadow of war, violence and nuclear
weapons. At this time Gandhi's policy of non-violence comes in everyone's mind. Gandhiji taught us
the lesson of peace. The whole world recognizes his importance that is why the United Nations
celebrates International Day of Non-Violence on his birthday on 2 October.
After the study of Gandhi philosophy, it appears that the body of the Mahatma was
made of ingredients of morality instead of flesh and blood .He believed in the moral purpose of human
life. He said that a person cannot have two consciences in both the personal and political spheres of

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human activities. The moral code should be followed equally. No matter how sacred the goal is, one
cannot use unholy means to accomplish, because there is the compulsory uniformity between means
and goals.
Morality is clearly visible in Gandhi's personality, work and principles. Ethics is
at the core of all ideas like truth, non-violence, purity of means, modernization of politics, trusteeship
theory, Theory of minimum state. Most of the problems of the present times can be found in Gandhi's
ethical ideas whether they are personal, regional, national or international. Today the need is to deepen
the Gandhian paradigms of morality, but the modern political leadership is a devotee of Machiavelli's
politics.
Undoubtedly, it can be said that Gandhiji nurtured the values of service and
humanity in politics by advocating religion and morality in politics. In today's politics, there are many
elements which are responsible of the moral decline of politics like corruption, criminalization, party-
change, horse-trading etc. Therefore, it can be said that - "We can’t find any area of Gandhi's thinking
that is not steeped in morality, nor can we find any such problem of today whose solution can't be cured
under Gandhian philosophy."

Reference books
1. Gandhi, Mohandas Karmchand:satya ke prayog - translator- Kashinath-Trivedi
Navjivan publication Ahmadabad 1961.
2. Gandhi: Hind Swaraj, writer-Amritlal Thakordas Nanavati Sarv Sewasangh prakashan
Rajghat, Varanasi 2009.
3. Kalalkar: Kaka: Gandhism and Socialism, Delhi 1939.
4. Pollak MG: Mahatma Gandhi: The Men, London 1931.
5. Pyarelal: Gandhian Techniques in the modern World, Ahmadabad, 1953.
6. Birla Ghanshyamdas : Bapu, Delhi, 1944.
7. K Santhanam :Gandhism and Analysis, Mumbai 1960.
8. Varma, S.L. : Mahatma Gandhi aur Dharmnirpekshta , Rajasthan Hindi Granth
Academy,1999, Jaipur.
9. Awasthi & Awasthi : Bhaarteey Raajneetik Chintan,Research Publication Jaipur.
10. Nagar, Purushottam: Aadhunik Bhaarteey Saamajik Aur Raajneetik Chintan, Rajasthan
Hindi Granth Academy,Harihar Jaipur.

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