CDS (II) 2021 General Knowledge · Question 45 of 120

Correct — C, Inauguration of Banaras Hindu University (1916). Gandhi returned from South Africa in January 1915 and, on Gokhale's advice, spent his first year travelling the country rather than speaking in it. His first major public appearance came at the opening of the Banaras Hindu University in February 1916, an occasion attended by princes, philanthropists and Congress leaders including Annie Besant, where he was still relatively unknown and had been invited on the strength of his South African work. When his turn came he attacked the assembled elite for their indifference to the labouring poor, called the ceremony a most gorgeous show, contrasted the richly bedecked noblemen present with the millions of the poor who were absent, and told them there could be no self-government while the peasant's produce was taken from him. That speech, not any of the campaigns, is the moment the question is pointing at.

• (a)Champaran (1917) — Champaran in 1917 was his first satyagraha on Indian soil — he went there after a peasant approached him at the Lucknow Congress in December 1916 — but it came a year after Banaras and was a local struggle, not a public appearance.
• (b)Kheda (1918) — Kheda in 1918, where he joined peasants seeking remission of land revenue after a failed harvest, came later still, in the same year as the Ahmedabad mill workers' dispute. Both were local campaigns in Gujarat.
• (d)Rowlatt Satyagraha (1919) — The Rowlatt Satyagraha of March and April 1919 was his first countrywide movement, which is a different superlative from first major public appearance. Three years separate the two.

Gandhi's Indian career has a clear early sequence: return in 1915, a year of travel, the Banaras speech of February 1916, then the three local campaigns of Champaran in 1917 and Kheda and Ahmedabad in 1918, and then the Rowlatt Satyagraha of 1919, which turned him into a national figure. Each stage has its own superlative, and questions are built by swapping them.

The trap is that Champaran is drilled into every candidate as the first something, so it is reached for reflexively. The way to keep the sequence straight is to attach a different word to each event — appearance to Banaras, satyagraha to Champaran, all-India campaign to Rowlatt. The Banaras speech matters historically as more than a date: it was the first public statement of the idea that Indian nationalism, until then a movement of lawyers, doctors and landlords, had to be made representative of peasants and workers, which is the programme Gandhi then spent the next five years executing.

• Gandhi returned to India from South Africa in January 1915 and spent a year travelling on Gokhale's advice.
• His first major public appearance was at the opening of the Banaras Hindu University in February 1916.
• He charged the assembled elite with indifference to the labouring poor and called the ceremony a most gorgeous show.
• Champaran followed in 1917, Kheda and the Ahmedabad mill workers' dispute in 1918 — all local struggles.
• The Rowlatt Satyagraha of March and April 1919 was his first countrywide campaign.

• Answering Champaran because it is the first satyagraha, when the question asks about a public appearance.
• Confusing first countrywide movement with first appearance — Rowlatt is the former.
• Assuming Gandhi was already a national figure in 1916; he was invited to Banaras for his South African record.

As a first-something item on Gandhi's early Indian career, or as a chronology of 1915 to 1919 to be arranged.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Mahatma Gandhi's first satyagraha in India was launched at

  • (a)Kheda
  • (b)Champaran
  • (c)Ahmedabad
  • (d)Bardoli

  Answer(b) Champaran — in 1917, on behalf of indigo cultivators of north Bihar, after a peasant approached him at the Lucknow Congress of December 1916.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Which one of the following was Mahatma Gandhi's first countrywide campaign?

  • (a)The Champaran movement
  • (b)The Rowlatt Satyagraha
  • (c)The Non-Cooperation Movement
  • (d)The Salt Satyagraha

  Answer(b) The Rowlatt Satyagraha — of March and April 1919, against the continuation of wartime powers of detention without trial.