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KF5JRV > TODAY 07.06.19 13:37l 8 Lines 2865 Bytes #999 (0) @ WW
BID : 37656_KF5JRV
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Subj: Today in History - Jun 07
Path: IW8PGT<IZ3LSV<IV3SCP<IW0QNL<VE2PKT<N3HYM<KF5JRV
Sent: 190607/1135Z 37656@KF5JRV.#NWAR.AR.USA.NA BPQ6.0.18
In an event that would have dramatic repercussions for the people ofIndia, Mohandas K. Gandhi, a young Indian lawyer working in SouthAfrica, refuses to comply with racial segregation rules on a SouthAfrican train and is forcibly ejected at Pietermaritzburg.Born in India and educated in England, Gandhi traveled to South Africain early 1893 to practice law under a one-year contract. Settling inNatal, he was subjected to racism and South African laws that restrictedthe rights of Indian laborers. Gandhi later recalled one such incident,in which he was removed from a first-class railway compartment andthrown off a train, as his moment of truth. From thereon, he decided tofight injustice and defend his rights as an Indian and a man.When his contract expired, he spontaneously decided to remain in SouthAfrica and launch a campaign against legislation that would depriveIndians of the right to vote. He formed the Natal Indian Congress anddrew international attention to the plight of Indians in South Africa.In 1906, the Transvaal government sought to further restrict the rightsof Indians, and Gandhi organized his first campaign of satyagraha, ormass civil disobedience. After seven years of protest, he negotiated acompromise agreement with the South African government.In 1914, Gandhi returned to India and lived a life of abstinence andspirituality on the periphery of Indian politics. He supported Britainin the First World War but in 1919 launched a new satyagraha in protestof Britain’s mandatory military draft of Indians. Hundreds of thousandsanswered his call to protest, and by 1920 he was leader of the Indianmovement for independence. Always nonviolent, he asserted the unity ofall people under one God and preached Christian and Muslim ethics alongwith his Hindu teachings. The British authorities jailed him severaltimes, but his following was so great that he was always released.ADVERTISEMENTAfter World War II, he was a leading figure in the negotiations that ledto Indian independence in 1947. Although hailing the granting of Indianindependence as the “noblest act of the British nation,ö he wasdistressed by the religious partition of the former Mogul Empire intoIndia and Pakistan. When violence broke out between Hindus and Muslimsin India in 1947, he resorted to fasts and visits to the troubled areasin an effort to end India’s religious strife. On January 30, 1948, hewas on one such prayer vigil in New Delhi when he was fatally shot byNathuram Godse, a Hindu extremist who objected to Gandhi’s tolerance forthe Muslims.Known as Mahatma, or “the great soul,ö during his lifetime, Gandhi’spersuasive methods of civil disobedience influenced leaders of civilrights movements around the world, especially Martin Luther King, Jr.,in the United States.
73 de Scott KF5JRV
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