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March 10, 1999Gandhi's grandson shares non-violent advice with NMC audienceStanding room only crowd turns out to hear about Indian leader
Record-Eagle staff writer TRAVERSE CITY - "It's essential that we live what we want our children to learn." These were only some of the words Arun Gandhi, grandson of India's late spiritual leader, "Mahatma" Gandhi, had for a standing room only audience at Northwestern Michigan College's Milliken Auditorium Tuesday. As a child living with his grandparents in India, Gandhi built a friendship with a boy who was about six years old. After some time passed in the friendship, the boy began to develop eruptions on his body that doctors attributed to an excess of sugar. Doctors told the boy's mother to eliminate sugar from his diet. Gandhi said his parents nagged the boy about not eating sweets while they themselves ate sugary treats. To no one's surprise the boy didn't stop eating sugar, and his condition did not improve. The boy's mother went to Gandhi's grandfather and pleaded with the spiritual leader to talk to her child. The elder Gandhi told her to come back in 15 days and if he had not stopped eating sugar he would talk to him. Gandhi told the audience the woman didn't understand why he couldn't talk to the boy at that time, but didn't want to question him. So 15 days passed and the woman returned to Gandhi with the boy, who hadn't stopped eating sugar. Gandhi spoke to the boy for half a minute, and the boy promised he wouldn't eat any more sugar. The woman was astonished and asked what kind of miracle it was. Gandhi told her that he had to give up sugar for 15 days before he could ask the boy to do the same. "We have to be the change we wish to see," Gandhi said. The woman might have chosen to punish her son for his refusal to stop eating sweets, but that also would have been unsuccessful. Punishment, whether non-violent or violent, doesn't work, he said. People who suffer punishment tend to heal from the punishment and go on practicing the same behaviors. Gandhi said that was only one of the many lessons he learned from his grandfather, who taught non-violence as a path to peace. To the enjoyment of many in the audience, Gandhi told the story of his grandfather's first lesson in non-violence, which came from his wife, Kasturbai. Mahatma and Kasturbai were married at the age of 13, and not knowing how to behave like a husband, Mahatma went out and bought some pamphlets on the subject. Gandhi said the pamphlets his grandfather took his first lessons in being a husband from were chauvinistic. They told him to control his wife and set down some laws. That day he told his wife that she could not leave the house without his permission. The next day she went about her usual business and left the house, and without Mahatma's permission. When he realized what was happening, he asked how dare she leave without his permission. She calmly told him that she had been raised to obey adults, and asked him if he was older than his mother. When he said no, she asked whether she should obey him or his mother when she asked him to do something. He realized that his mother probably wouldn't appreciate him disobeying her, so he forgot about his rule. Kasturbai got what she wanted without using violence. "That was Gandhi's first lesson in non-violence." |
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