Arun Manilal Gandhi
This article needs additional citations for verification. (May 2023) |
Arun Gandhi | |
---|---|
Natal Province, South Africa | |
Died | 2 May 2023 , India | (aged 89)
Nationality | Indian, South African, American |
Citizenship | American |
Spouse |
Sunanda Gandhi
(m. 1957; died 2007) |
Children | 2, including Tushar |
Parent(s) | Manilal Gandhi Sushila Mashruwala |
Relatives | Ela Gandhi (sister) Mahatma Gandhi (grandfather) Kasturba Gandhi (grandmother) |
Arun Manilal Gandhi (14 April 1934 – 2 May 2023) was a South African-born Indian-American author, socio-political activist and son of Manilal Gandhi, thus a grandson of nationalist leader Mahatma Gandhi. In 2017, he published The Gift of Anger: And Other Lessons From My Grandfather Mahatma Gandhi (New York: Gallery Books/Jeter Publishing 2017).
Gandhi criticized the Indian government in an article he wrote after they subsidized a 1982 film based on his grandfather's life with $25 million. He immigrated to the United States with his family in 1987 where he studied at the University of Mississippi. They later moved to Memphis, Tennessee, where they founded a nonviolence institute hosted by the Christian Brothers University.
Early life
Arun Manilal Gandhi was born on 14 April 1934, in Durban, to Manilal Gandhi and Sushila Mashruwala. His father was an editor and his mother was a publisher for the Indian Opinion. Arun had seen his grandfather Mahatma Gandhi once briefly at age 5 and didn't see him again until 1946 when he lived with Mahatma Gandhi at the Sevagram ashram in India. Arun returned to the Union of South Africa in 1947, just weeks before his grandfather was assassinated.[1]
While living at Sevagram, Arun had the advantage of education over the illiterate farm families who worked the surrounding fields. His grandfather urged him to play with the neighboring children after school in order to "learn what it was like to live in poverty", as well as to teach those children what he learned in class each day, which Arun Gandhi later described as "the most creative and enlightening experience for me." Eventually, crowds of children and their parents started showing up for lessons with the young Gandhi, which taught him compassion and the need to share.[2]
Career
In 1982, when Columbia Pictures released the feature film, Gandhi, based on his grandfather's life, Gandhi wrote an article criticizing the Indian government for subsidizing the film with $25 million, arguing that there were more important things to spend such money on. Though his article was widely reprinted and celebrated, after attending a special screening of the film, Gandhi included that it accurately conveyed his grandfather's philosophy and legacy (despite its historical inaccuracies), and was so moved by it that he wrote another article retracting the first one.[3]
In 1987, Arun Gandhi moved to the United States along with his wife, Sunanda, to work on a study at the
In 2003, Gandhi was one of the signatories to Humanism and Its Aspirations (Humanist Manifesto III).[7]
In late 2007, Gandhi co-taught a course entitled "Gandhi on Personal Leadership and Nonviolence" at Salisbury University in Salisbury, Maryland.[8] On 12 November 2007, Gandhi gave a lecture for the Salisbury University Center for Conflict Resolution's “One Person Can Make a Difference” Lecture Series, entitled “Nonviolence in the Age of Terrorism”.[9] In late 2008, Gandhi returned to Salisbury University to co-teach a course entitled "The Global Impact of Gandhi".[10]
In 2007, after the passing of his wife Sunanda on 21 February, the institute moved to Rochester, New York, and is currently located on the University of Rochester River Campus.[11] After January 2008 op-ed in The Washington Post's "On Faith" section where Gandhi said that Israelis talked too much about the Holocaust and were losing world sympathy and that Israel and the U.S. were the biggest contributors to the world-threatening "culture of violence", his ties to Rochester were imperiled. He claimed that dwelling on the past wouldn't allow them to move forward. Gandhi apologized by saying he had only meant to say right-wing Likud supporters were part of the problem, but the university did not accept his explanation and informed him that the institute would be closed unless he resigned from it. Gandhi then quit, making an erroneous prediction that he would be able to return in several months when the furor over his actions died down (he never came back in any capacity before his death in 2023).[citation needed]
Gandhi had given many speeches about nonviolence in many countries. During his tour to
On 12 October 2009 Gandhi visited the Brunton Theatre in Musselburgh to talk to P7's from all over East Lothian in Scotland.[citation needed] On 11 November 2009 Gandhi visited Chattanooga State Technical Community College in Chattanooga, Tennessee, to speak and spread his message of peace.[citation needed] On 13 November 2009, Gandhi visited Cleveland State Community College in Cleveland, Tennessee, to speak and spread his message of peace. On 16 November 2010, Gandhi visited The University of Wyoming in Laramie, Wyoming, to speak and spread his message of peace.[13]
On 2 March 2011, Arun Gandhi spoke at the East West Center on the campus of the
Gandhi's 2011 tour of Honolulu was sponsored by Barbara Altemus of the We Are One Foundation and by the Gandhian International Institute for Peace. Gandhi is featured in "THE CALLING: Heal Ourselves Heal our Planet" a Documentary Film in Production created by Barbara Altemus, directed by Oscar-nominated William Gazecki.[citation needed]
On 23 March 2012, Gandhi was the keynote speaker at the first annual Engaging Peace Conference at Arcadia University in Glenside, Pennsylvania.[15]
In March 2014, Atheneum Books for Young Readers published Grandfather Gandhi, a children's book that Arun Gandhi co-authored with Bethany Hegedus, and illustrated by Evan Turk.[16] The picture book memoir, which carries a pro-peace message, tells the story of how Arun's grandfather, likening anger to lightning that could either destroy or illuminate, taught Arun to respond to injustice using peaceful methods, in order to "turn darkness into light". The book also focuses on how Arun, jealous of the other people who commanded his grandfather's attention, frustrated with his schoolwork, and embarrassed at his inability to control his anger, strove to make his grandfather proud. The book was met with positive reviews for its use of a child's point of view in order to make a complex historical issue understandable to child readers, and for Turk's use of cut-paper abstract images to create illustrations with emotional resonance.[17][18][19] He also published Legacy of Love: My Education in the Path of Nonviolence.[citation needed]
Personal life and death
Gandhi considered himself to be a
Gandhi met nurse Sunanda in a hospital and they married in 1957. The couple had 2 children, Tushar, born on 17 January 1960, and Archana. Gandhi and Sunanda stayed married until her death on 21 February 2007.[citation needed]
As of 2016, Gandhi resided in Rochester, New York.[2]
Gandhi died at the Sunanda Gandhi Home for Girls in Kolhapur, on 2 May 2023. He was 89.[22]
See also
References
- ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 7 May 2023.
- ^ a b Hewitt, Scott (18 January 2015). "Gandhi's grandson urges change from within". The Columbian.
- ^ (18 January 2015) Arun Gandhi on movie "Gandhi"
- ^ Peace Abbey Awards, list of recipients
- ^ Housden, R. (1999) Sacred America: The emerging spirit of the people. Simon & Schuster. p 201.
- ^ Morrissey, M.M. (2003) New Thought: A Practical Spirituality. Penguin.
- ^ (8 May 2018) Human Manifesto III Signers
- ^ "Dr. Brian Polkinghorn Wins Prestigious Elkins Award". Salisbury University. 17 July 2007. Archived from the original on 5 August 2012. Retrieved 22 June 2020.
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: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link) - ^ "Dr. Arun Gandhi Speaks on Nonviolence November 12". Salisbury University. 23 October 2007. Archived from the original on 5 August 2012. Retrieved 22 June 2020.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link) - ^ "SU's Polkinghorn Receives Second Elkins Professorship". Salisbury University. 12 September 2008. Archived from the original on 5 August 2012. Retrieved 22 June 2020.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link) - ^ Gandhi Institute for Nonviolence Relocates to University of Rochester, 1 June 2007 press release, University of Rochester.
- ^ March home, urges Gandhi grandson, 31 August 2004.
- ^ "UW Social Justice Research Center Hosts Gandhi's Grandson Nov. 16 | News | University of Wyoming".
- ^ (7 March 2011) "Gandhi's talk in Honolulu"
- ^ (23 March 2012) Engaging Peace Conference
- ^ Rule, Adi (16 April 2014). "Bethany Hegedus, Arun Gandhi, and GRANDFATHER GANDHI" Archived 19 October 2017 at the Wayback Machine. "the MFA in Writing for Children & Young Adults Author Blog", Vermont College of Fine Arts.
- ^ Bird, Elizabeth (8 April 2014). "Review of the Day: Grandfather Gandhi by Arun Gandhi and Bethany Hegedus". School Library Journal.
- ^ Smith, Robin (4 November 2014). "Grandfather Gandhi". The Horn Book Magazine.
- ^ "Grandfather Gandhi". Publishers Weekly. Retrieved 6 September 2015.
- ^ Arun Gandhi reaches beyond Hindu religious traditions
- ^ (8 May 2018) Arun Gandhi Biography Archived 4 March 2019 at the Wayback Machine
- ^ "Mahatma Gandhi's grandson Arun Gandhi passes away at 89". The Times of India. 2 May 2023. Retrieved 2 May 2023.