Question

What was the incident that prompted gandhi to rises his voice of protest against the british?

Answer 1

It was due to the dogged determination of an illiterate but resolute sharecropper from Champaran called Rajkumar Shukla which helped Gandhi make the decision of urging the British to leave India. The poor indigo sharecroppers were badly exploited by the British planters and Shukla followed Gandhi around the country until the latter gave him his time. As the official inquiry began, a crushing mountain of evidence was found against big planters and when they saw this they agreed in principle to refund the peasants. But the question was over the amount of payment. They thought Gandhi would demand repayment in full of the money which they had illegally and deceitfully taken from the sharecroppers. However, Gandhi asked for only 50 percent and it was on this amount that he seemed adamant. The planters thought that he would not give way so the representative of the planters offered to refund to the extent of 25 percent. To their amazement, Gandhi agreed and took him at his word leading to the breaking of the deadlock. This settlement was adopted unanimously by the commission.
Gandhi explained that the amount of the refund was not important. The real breakthrough lay in the fact that the landlords had been obliged to surrender part of the money and with it their prestige. Therefore, as far as the peasants were concerned, the planters had behaved as lords above the law so far. Now the peasant saw that he also had rights that could not be infringed and defenders of those rights.