Gandhi’s Concept of Satyagraha

Dr. Preeti Singh

Department of Political Science

Vasanta College foe Women, Rajghat, Varanasi

Concept of Satyagraha

• Satyagraha is a unique technique developed by Gandhi for bringing social change and to fight for justice.
• Satyagraha is combination of two words satya (truth) and agraha (insistence) which means ‘ insisting on holding firmly truth’ and the strength to fight for truth comes from unconditional devotion to truth , what Gandhi says ‘truth is God’. The path to reach truth is non-violence.
• There are three essential components of Satyagraha:
• Truth
• Non-violence
• Self-Suffering

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Concept of Truth

• Gandhi’s whole life and philosophy was a search for truth and ultimately he reached to the conclusion that ‘Truth is God’: ‘I used to say ‘God is truth’: But some men deny God. Some are forced by their passion for truth to say that there is no God, and in their own way they are right. So now I say, ‘Truth is God’. No one can say ‘Truth does not exist’ without removing all truth from his statement. Therefore I prefer to say ‘Truth is God’.
• Gandhi has full faith in existence of a universal Truth which is never changing but this cannot be discerned by human beings due to limitation of their comprehension. Hence, in Gandhi there are two types of truth: Partial Truth & Absolute Truth

Concept of Truth

• Therefore, he believes that ‘we must be content with believing the truth as it appears to us’ and keep on moving in the search without clinging to our own view of truths as absolute because it will distance us from truth.
• Gandhi’s concept of truth has immense relevance of for making of a democratic society as it establishes significance of dialogue as essential for reaching truth.

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Concept of Truth

• To quote Gandhi, : ‘It has been my experience that I am always true from my point of view and often wrong from the point of view of my honest critics. I know that we are both right from our respective points of views. And this knowledge saves me from attributing motives to my opponents or critics... It is this doctrine of the manyness of reality that has taught me to judge a Mussalman from his own standpoint and Christian from his.’

Concept of Nonviolence

• In Gandhi’s theory of Satyagrah ahimsa is the only path for reaching truth. As he says : ‘In the pursuit of Satyagraha, I discovered in the earliest stage that pursuit of Truth did not admit violence being inflicted on one’s opponent, but that he must be weaned from error by patience and sympathy. For what appears to be Truth to one may appear false to the other.’
• Non-violence is of two types.
• Negative Meaning of Ahimsa: Absence of Mental and Physical Nonviolence
• Positive Meaning of Ahimsa: The Largest Love

Concept of Nonviolence

• For Gandhi, non-violence meant ‘both passive and active love, refraining from causing harm and destruction to living beings as well as positively promoting their well being.’
• Explaining the meaning of his non-violence Gandhi says: ‘…in its negative form, [ahimsa] means not injuring any living being whether by body or mind. I may not, therefore, hurt the person of any wrong-doer or bear any ill-will to him and so cause him mental suffering. In its positive form, ahimsa means the largest love, the greatest charity. If I am a follower of ahimsa , I must love my enemy or a stranger to me as I would my wrong-doing father or son. This active ahimsa necessarily included truth and fearlessness’.
• Thus, Gandhi’s non-violence is not non-resistance but ‘non-violent resistance.

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Types of Nonviolence �

In Gandhi’s concept of non-violence, non-violence can be of three types:

• First, where non-violence is practiced because it has intrinsic value for the practitioner.
• Second, where non-violence is practiced because it has instrumental value.
• Third, where non-violence is practiced out of fear what is called ‘non-violence of the coward’. Gandhi consider this type of violence as the worst type of non-violence , in fact worse than violence. Non-violence and fear cannot go together.

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Self-Suffering

• A soldier of truth (Satyagrahi) fights for truth not with body force but with soul force as it is an appeal to the soul of the opponent and not to the mind . Hence self-suffering is considered as the greatest weapon in Satyagraha. Gandhi writes: ‘I have found that mere appeal to reason does not answer where prejudices are age long and based on supposed religious authority. Reason has to be strengthened by suffering.’
• Gandhi believes that self-suffering is superior to the sacrifice of other. Gandhi explains: ‘Non-violence in its dynamic condition means conscious suffering. It does not mean meek submission to the will of evil-doer, but it means putting of one’s whole soul against the will of the tyrant’.

Self-Suffering

• Stressing the significance of self-suffering, Gandhi writes: ‘We have to endure every hardship that we can imagine and wisdom lies in pledging ourselves on the understanding that we shall have to suffer all that and worse. If someone asks me when and how the struggle may end. I may say that if the entire community manfully stands the test, the end will be near…That as long as there is even a handful of man true to their pledge, there can only be one end to the struggle and that is victory.’

Features of Satyagraha

• It is a moral weapon for socio-political change.
• It believes in the possibility of ‘change of heart’.
• It is based on the belief of goodness of human being.
• It applies soul force in place of physical force for bringing change.
• In it there is no ill will for the enemy but rather unconditional love.
• There is no fear of defeat in Satyagraha.
• No place of secrecy in Satyagraha , Satyagrahi will always have a pure(transparent) heart.
• Satyagraha can be done even against one’s near and dear ones and not only against one’s enemy, in fact there is no enemy in Satyagraha.
• Satyagraha is not merely Passive Resistance .

Satyagraha and Passive Resistance

• Passive resistance intends to make the opponent suffer but Satyagraha believes in self-suffering.
• In Satyagraha fight is against the evil and not against any person hence it can be done against even our dear and near ones but passive resistance cannot be done against the loved ones.
• In passive resistance since non-violence is adopted in a mechanical manner hence there may be possibility of use of violence in it but in Satyagraha it is absolutely impossible because Satyagraha starts only when the Satyagrahi is fully free from violence.

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Satyagraha and Passive Resistance

• Passive resistance is a political weapon but Satyagraha is a moral weapon which may be used in the political sphere as well as other spheres.
• Passive resistance is the weapon of the weak who choose non-violence out of fear or on the basis of utility principle but Satyagraha is the weapon of brave who adopts non-violence fearlessly and is always ready to suffer.
• In Satyagraha there is no place for hatred as it is based on largest love but in passive résistance there is no scope for love.

Methods of Satyagraha

The methods of Satyagraha include:

• Persuasion with pure love
• Non-cooperation : Strike, Boycott etc
• Civil Disobedience : picketing, non-payment of taxes etc
• Fasts
• Constructive Programme: promoting inter-communal harmony, removal of untouchability, adult education etc
• Explaining methods of Satyagraha, Thomas Pantham writes: ‘In a satyagraha movement, the contested truth of a social system or norm is sought to be validated through three steps: (i) persuading the opponents through reasoning and being open to , and inviting, the counter-persuasive efforts of the opponents; (ii) appealing to the opponents through the self-suffering of the satyagrahis; and (iii) non-cooperation and civil disobedience.’

Critique

• Many of the scholars find Gandhi’s method of Satyagraha as too ideal to deal with violent oppression.
• Gandhi’s ideal of self suffering and change of heart has been seen by many as other –worldly .
• George Orwell argues that ‘Gandhi’s teachings cannot be squared with the belief that man is the measure of all things and that our job is to make life worth living on this earth.’ In other word, Gandhi’s method is not in match with actual human nature and the human world.
• Tilak also argued that the method of absolute non-violence is too moral to be applied in the world of politics. He said that politics ‘is a game of worldly people and not of sadhus’.

Conclusion

• However, Gandhi always believed that non-violence is possible in this world. Gandhi’s this faith can be understood only against the background of his view on human nature. Gandhi has immense faith in goodness of human being . Therefore, he has full faith in the possibility of change of heart. Following statements of Gandhi related to human nature will help us to understand why Satyagraha appears practical method to Gandhi in all situations:
• “ I refuse to suspect human nature. Its will is bound to respond to any noble and friendly actions.”

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Conclusion

• “There are chords in every human heart if we only know how to strike the right chord, we bring out the music.”
• “We are born with brute strength but we were born in order to realize God who dwells in us. That indeed is the privilege of man and it distinguishes him from the brute creations.”
• “Man as animal is violent but as spirit is non-violent. The moment he awakens to the spirit within he cannot remain violent.”

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