I accidentally happened to read Hind Swaraj by M. K. Gandhi yesterday. To be very frank, I am appalled with his thinking.
At times, it touches insanity: Railways are bad because it spreads famines; doctors are bad because they do vivisection; there is no real service to humanity in medical profession; lawyers are bad because they get justice through courts, which according to him is as bad as solving disputes by fighting a duel; parliament is a prostitute with changing masters; religious fundamentalism is better than civilization, for civilization debase man with better clothes, better machinery, better education, better science, etc; science is useless, only religious knowledge is enough; God made man with limited mental faculties, but the man challenges the Godhead with his novel experiments; human body is made to move only small distances, therefore locomotives are bad; women are best suited for household chores, not factories.
At times, it is too very similar to Sanghi thinking: his idea of India is almost the same as that of Sanghis, i.e. Hindu Rashtra, except that he didn’t propogate violence. He thought that the nation called India was uniquely so because there are ancient Hindu pilgrimage centres at each corner of the Indian nation; i.e., Haridwar in North, Rameshwaram in South, Jaganathpuri in East; uniquely binding the nation of India. He thought Mohemmedans who have come to India have accepted the Indian culture, and thus they are Indians. He thought the Britishers would be free to live in India if they would Indianize themselves similarily.
And his idea of Swaraj is also nothing less than fantastic. According to him Swaraj is a state when the farmers use the same old plough, not tractors; all people live in petty cottages in villages, and none lives in apartments and bungalows in towns and cities; workers would do only that which they can do with their own hands and limbs, not machinery; lawyers would charge a regulation wage equal to that of laborers.
After reading it I am sure I am anything but a Gandhian. LOL.
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