Gandhi Jayanti

Last Friday we visited the State Rooms at the Buckingham Palace where an exhibition marking the 60th Wedding Anniversary of the Queen was on. There were expensive gifts... and there were ridiculously expensive gifts.

But my eyes were seeking the cheapest and yet priceless gift of them all!

The specific gift I was looking for was - a cloth woven from the yarn specially spun by Mahatma Gandhi for the Queen bearing the words 'Jai Hind'. Do read more about it here.

As children we would enjoy the day off at home. My Mother would force us to watch 'Gandhi' the movie by Richard Attenborough. I remember finding the movie very boring and cursing Doordarshan for showing the same movie 3 times a year ... year after year - on Independence and Republic Day and on 2nd October. They're saving money on hiring another movie I would say :D!

With the passing years 2nd October completely lost its significance. It became a day- off between two exams and later an 'unofficial' working day.
If I did enjoy a holiday, Doordarshan was definitely not the channel I was watching!

Two years back I read Louis Fischer's - The Life of Mahatma Gandhi.
Why I read it ...I really don't know....but I have developed an interest in our history.
Maybe because in a strange way I feel more 'Indian' here than I have ever felt back home in India.

Here, after seeing oh- so-many programmes on the many wars Britain has fought... have I developed a great admiration and respect for our powerful yet non-violent Struggle for Independence. Here our experiences seem more real and not just page in my History book.

A friend once remarked that though Gandhiji is probably the strongest symbol of Non Violence and despite being nominated 5 times he was never awarded the Nobel Prize. I doubt if it would have mattered either way to him. Do read the article on the Missing Laureate.

"Generations to come, it may be, will scarce believe that such one as this ever in flesh and blood walked upon this earth". -A Einstein on M K Gandhi

This year I watched the movie 'Gandhi' on tv on 15 August in London..... & my Mother was not here forcing me!

Yes, I guess I'm evolving very slowly....and trying, in a small way, to be the change I (you) wish to see in the world.