“A TRULY ATOMIC MAN IN ATOMIC AGE”:
AN APPROACH TO GANDHIJI
Dr. K. VENKATA REDDY and
K. SUBBARANGAIAH
Gandhiji is generally acknowledged and widely acclaimed
as Father of the Nation, social reformer, a philosopher, a practical idealist,
an apostle of Truth and non-violence, a Satyagrahi
and above all, a seer and a saint. But, he is scarcely, if at all, referred to
as a scientist. How can Gandhiji be called a scientist, one would immediately
react, when he has nothing to do with science. But, a close study of Gandhi and
his life reveals that he was scientific in whatever he said or did. Sri Shrimannarayan, who recently passed away, hardly
exaggerated when he said that Gandhiji was “a truly atomic man in atomic age.”
A scientist is one who has some postulates which he seeks
to verify by means of an experiment in his laboratory. Whatever may be his
postulates or hypotheses, and whatever may be his experiments the scientist’s
ultimate aim is to seek Truth. Approached from this angle Gandhiji comes to us
unfailingly as a scientist. For, he accepted Truth as the only law that
governed him.
If Gandhiji is a scientist his postulates are the social
and moral values of life. His experiments are Truth and non-violence and his
laboratory is society. The very fact that he chose to call his autobiography
“The Story of my Experiments with Truth” goes a long way in suggesting to us
his scientific approach towards life and its problems.
Gandhiji was, no doubt; an idealist–but a practical
idealist. He had no use for any ideals if they were not capable of being acted
upon in life. So, like a scientist, Gandhiji would cherish and accept any
ideal, however good or great it may be, only when it stands the litmus test of
Truth and non-violence. He summarily rejects all that is untruthful and
violent. Thus Gandhiji, like a scientist, is also searcher after Truth, As he himself wrote in Young India (Dec. 3, 1925)
I
am a searcher after Truth. My experiments I hold to be infinitely more
important than the best-equipped Himalayan expeditions. And
the results? If the search is scientific, surely there is no compassion
between the two. Let me, therefore, go my way. I shall lose my usefulness the
moment I stifle the still small voice within.
A
scientist gives as much importance to the method of experimentation as to his
results. Because he knows full well that unless the experiment is right the
result cannot be right. In the same manner Gandhiji gave as much importance to
the means as to the ends. He never subscribed to the Machiavillian
principle that the end justifies the means. He emphatically observed:
They
say means are after all means. I would say means are after all everything. As the means so the end. There is no wall of separation
between means and end.
Gandhiji
compared means to a seed and the end to a tree and said:
There
is just the same inviolable connection between the means and the end as there
is between the seed and tree.
Gandhiji
stuck to this golden ideal through thick and thin without worrying about the
immediate results, again like a true scientist. He was fully convinced that our
ultimate progress towards the goal would be in exact proportion to the purity
of our means just as the accuracy of the results is dependent on the accuracy of
the experimental set up used. Gandhiji judges the purity of his means in
consonance with the demands of Truth and non-violence.
Even
during the freedom struggle Gandhiji never compromised with the principles of
Truth and non-violence for achieving temporary gains. He was prepared to
sacrifice everything for winning
Thus,
like a scientist, Gandhiji experimented various social
and moral concepts with Truth and non-violence in the laboratory of his life
and derived the ideals of Satyagraha, self-reliance, non-possession,
trusteeship, equality of sex, dignity of manual labour,
Brahmacharya, Sarvodaya,
oneness of religion and God. Hence their validity and universal appeal to us
today.
Gandhiji’s
religion was also essentially rational. By religion he did not mean formal religion
or custom treated as religion. He meant the
religion that underlies all religions
“which brings us”, as he
put it, “face to face with our Maker.”
Gandhiji was a devout but rational
Hindu. He was deeply religious,
but he was not much interested in
theology or metaphysics. He stressed ethical considerations above all. He would not accept any belief
which did not appeal to his sense
of reasoning or any injunction which
did not satisfy his conscience. He tended to explain and interpret every religious text to suit his rationality. As Rajaji pointed Out, Gandhiji “looked upon the Ramayana and the Mahabharata as mere allegories and Rama was
just a name for God with him.”
It is true that in his experiments with Truth and
non-violence Gandhiji did not
always succeed, again as it is the
case with scientists. As no
true scientist would ever be
deterred by his failures, Gandhiji did
not lose his spirit with the failures he encountered: Instead, he
derived positive pleasure from
each bitter experience and
marched forward stronger than what he was. As Gandhiji himself
expressed:
I
am but a Poor struggling soul
yearning to be wholly good, wholly
truthful, and wholly non-violent
in thought, word, and deed, but ever falling to reach the ideal which I know to be true. It is painful but
the pain of it is a positive pleasure to me. Each step upward
makes me feel stronger and fit for the next.