Question

Write a short note on Gandhiji's concept of 'Swadeshi'

Answer 1

Satyagraha and swadeshi are fundamental in Gandhi's philosophy of life. According to Gandhi, the whole gamut of man's activities constitutes an indivisible whole. Life cannot be segregated into watertight compartments like social, economic, political, religious and so on. So the ideas and concepts he developed in the course of his relentless experiments with truth was an attempt to integrate the various aspects of life. The concept of swadeshi was not an exception. It was not merely an economic doctrine. In fact the concept of swadeshi covered all aspects of the human life. Gandhi's vision of swadeshi is a universal concept even though he propounded it in the context of India's struggle for freedom. He used swadeshi as a means to achieve India's swaraj. India's struggle for freedom was a source of inspiration for many non-violent struggles in different parts of the globe. Swaraj through swadeshi is a principle of universal application and it can be emulated by people in their struggle for freedom. It was one of the eleven vows Gandhi prescribed for a satygraha way of life. In this paper an attempt has been made to understand Gandhi's concept of swadeshi and its manifestation in important facets of human life. Swadeshi as a generic concept covers almost every aspect of human life, all his ideas, concepts, methods and programmes....

Answer 2

Satyagraha and swadeshi are fundamental in Gandhi's philosophy of life. According to Gandhi, the whole gamut of man's activities constitutes an indivisible whole. Life cannot be segregated into watertight compartments like social, economic, political, religious and so on. So the ideas and concepts he developed in the course of his relentless experiments with truth was an attempt to integrate the various aspects of life. The concept of swadeshi was not an exception. It was not merely an economic doctrine. In fact the concept of swadeshi covered all aspects of the human life. Gandhi's vision of swadeshi is a universal concept even though he propounded it in the context of India's struggle for freedom. He used swadeshi as a means to achieve India's swaraj. India's struggle for freedom was a source of inspiration for many non-violent struggles in different parts of the globe. Swaraj through swadeshi is a principle of universal application and it can be emulated by people in their struggle for freedom. It was one of the eleven vows Gandhi prescribed for a satygraha way of life. In this paper an attempt has been made to understand Gandhi's concept of swadeshi and its manifestation in important facets of human life. Swadeshi as a generic concept covers almost every aspect of human life, all his ideas, concepts, methods and programmes. However, the scope of the present paper has been limited to areas such as economic, political, social, religious, and educational and health. Firstly, we will analyse Gandhi's vision of swadeshi.

Gandhi's vision of Swadeshi

Gandhi described swadeshi as 'law of laws'1 ingrained in the basic nature of human being. It is a universal law. Like nature's law it needs no enacting. It is self-acting one. When one neglects or disobeys it due to ignorance or other reasons, the law takes its own course to restore to the original position like the laws of nature. The necessity for the inclusion of swadeshi as a vow is due to the fact that the people have forgotten this law; to use Gandhi's own words, the law is sunk into oblivion. A person by temperament following this law need not follow it as a vow, that is, a rare thing. According to Gandhi swadeshi in its ultimate and spiritual sense stands for the final emancipation of the soul from her earthly bondage. Therefore, a votary of swadeshi has to identify oneself with the entire creation in the ultimate quest to emancipate the soul from the physical body, as it stands in the way of realising oneness with all life.