Celebrating Gandhi’s Birthday in India
October 2nd is Mahatma Gandhi’s birthday and a national holiday in India. This year I had the honor of being in India on the special day known as Gandhi Jayanti. Unfortunately I was feeling under the weather (literally, the pollution was getting to me) but I celebrated it anyway by watching the movie Gandhi on cable television and by following the other celebrations throughout the city.
The India people call Gandhi Bapu, which means father in Hindi. He is considered the father of the nation, and for very good reason. Few people have had such a profound influence on a nation as Mahatma Gandhi has on India. He championed the resistance against Britain for independence and after decades of peaceful protests resulting in imprisonment, cruelty and genocide of the Indian people, the nation finally was granted independence on August 15th, 1947.