Gandhi, Godse and Geeta

This article is by Dost Mittar??

The most important part of the Gita is of course that it takes the form of dialog and arguments that took place between Krishna and Arjuna. There was some notion of debate, of coming to an understanding of the consequences of ones action, of determining one`s svadharma.

Can you seriously affirm this was the case for Godse`s actions? If so, what were these arguments? What were Godse`s goals? How did his actions further them?

Godse`s actions are reflected in some other aspects of Mahabharata. I refer here to the revenge killings that took place between the K`s and P`s. And all that came out of them was the deepest suffering and loss. This is made explicit in statements by Arjun and Yudhistira after their victory. So what does this context suggest about Godse?

harimau #7
You are mistaken. The story goes that legally, being blind Dhritrarashtra could not be king and so his brother was King. When King Pandu died, Dhritrarashtra became the Regent while waiting for the princes to grow up while Yudhishtra was heir apparent all along. Looking at C Rajagopalachari`s Mahabharata in English, Duryodhana himself mentions this in a number of conversations, eg when persuading his father to allow him to plot against the Pandavas.

Your remark re the villiany of the Kauravas is also not accurate. Its not the claim of the Kauravas on the kingdom which makes them villianous, there was a lot of villiany quite apart from this.

Godse was not a warrior. He was a cold-blooded murderer.

``There was no joy in this task for Godse. In killing Gandhi...``

ah a joyless assassination!

my sympathies for poor Mahatma Godse.

Stuka

``The author`s interpretation of Gandhi and Godse is therefore closer to the essence of the Gita. ``

No No No.........how could you deduce that. Even this statement of yours contradict your first paragraph. Let me give you an example how:

Suppose there is a professor of dentistry teaching his class and showing slides to his student. He begines his class by making this statement

OPENING STATEMENT: ``Toothpaste is good for dental health and lack of its use causes dental Health problems``

Next he shows a slide of healthy teeth and makes this statement:

FIRST STATEMENT: ``Regular use of toothpaste has resulted in healthy teeth``

This statement coincides with with his original premise.

Next he shows another slide of decayed teeth and makes this statement:

SECOND STATEMENT: ``Regular use of tooth paste has resulted in decayed teeth``

This statement is inconsistent with his opening statement. When a student points out to this error the professor insists that he is correct. So if you are an independent observer you may deduce one of the following:

- Opening statement, and first statement are correct but second statement is incorrect.

- Second statement is correct and that results in opening statement and first statement being incorrect.

- First and second statement are correct and therefore opening statement must be irrelevant.

The author of this article uses the third case logic and fallaciously insists that opening statement is not irrelevant. Authors opening statement is:

``Gita is a source of moral code and Pandwas acted correctly because they acted on this moral code``

First statement ``Gandhi did what he did because he acted on Gita``

Second statement ``Godse did what he did because he acted on Gita``

So if we apply the toothpaste anonolgy here the Gita becomes irrelevant if we assume that first and second statement are correct..................is anyone reading this? helllo is someone out there?

I must confess that sometimes -- there are moments of altered states of my mind -- when I end up writing Pure Trash on Chowk --

what I didn`t know is --that it can happen to some of my best friends as well.....

Sadna

``. Another is if a person reads the Mahabharata in a single sitting, he will lose his sanity``

A couple of episodes that I watched on TV did that to me. However, I must admit that I have hots for the chick who played the role of Subudra, Lord Krishan`s sister. She can definitely cause strife in a family, if you know what I mean :)

dost-mittarji

Welcome ! Its always nice to know chowkwallahs real names :).

Thanks for a thought provoking article. IMO such a topic requires experts to credibly tackle the huge scope of the subject matter and do it full justice.

My 1-paisas` worth on the questions you raised in the end:

``should holy scriptures play a role in morality``
If you mean the Geeta, IMO it depends on individual inclination. In my humble opinion, a person`s morality is his own responsibility and holy scripture can at the most be a guide, a reference or a corroboration (or a negation as the case may be) :).

If by holy scriptures, you mean the Mahabharata, well there are strong traditional advisories against doing so. One such warning adage is that no copy of Mahabharata should be kept in the house, as it will cause strife in the family. Another is if a person reads the Mahabharata in a single sitting, he will lose his sanity. The main reason as I understand it is, that the Mahabharata raises more questions than it answers. Its storyline and characterisations are such that there are , no simple and moral certainities illustrated, no simple and clear cut role models, in other words, very grudging relief offered to the reader as to unambiguous affirmation of principle.

``So, who was following the message of Geeta in the true sense? Gandhi, Godse or both?``

Gandhi was a great man who did a lot better than us ordinary joes, IMO, inspite of and given his faults.
I am not acquainted with Godse`s thinking, but I don`t think he was being true to the Geeta. For one, he didnot use his head very much, it seems, about what he was trying to accomplish by killing Gandhiji. Correct me if I am wrong but Gandhiji was at the time almost 80, and already detached from public life and the hustle bustle of a new country`s governance. At such a time, the assassination of Gandhi only led to a public backlash against those whom Godse had ideological sympathy with, that people held it up as a reason to keep them at arm`s length and consequently Gandhi`s (and their opponent Nehru`s) agenda only got strengthened not weakened.

Incidentally, something I`ve been wanting to point out wrt the Mahabharata war and Krishna`s role in it is that Krishna was cousin to both the Kauravas and to the Pandavas, so he didnot wish to either take up arms personally nor take sides. So he offered that he himself would join one side as an unarmed noncombatant and his army would fight on the opposite side to balance things out.

Arjuna chose Krishna as noncombatant to be on his own side(and Krishna served as his charioteer) and Duryodhana was equally happy to have Krishna`s Yadava army assigned to fight on the Kaurava side.

Krishna`s elder brother Balram displayed yet another degree of detachment, he was so angry and disgusted with the whole idea of war between the cousins that he refused to have anything to do with it and went off on a long journey.

The contrast between Krishna`s and Balram`s courses of action is a simple example of the sort of question the Mahabharata raises but doesnot answer. Which is, given a conflict among those whom you love, is it helpful or harmful to stay put and try to see justice done or is it best to stay away and wash ones hands of it.

Nand,

The central element of the advice in geeta relates the attitude with which a task is to be performed, it should be in a detached , disinterested manner with out any sense of ego, beyond the notion of good and bad, in a trascendaental manner. Most of the main charectors like drona, bheshma etc knew the outcome of the war and who would kill them, still they fought like hell in the purest sense of ones duty. The war stopped at dusk and the two enemies discussed matters as friend only to resume the fight early in the morning, that was thir task, there was no animosity.

This is in sharp contrast to the notion of jihad where the promise of heaven leads to war in an ultimate display of greed and haterd as evidenced by the mutilation of bodies in kargill invasion.

In terms of the purity of intentions, may be gandhi and godse are comparable. Contribution of godse to the enduring legacy of gandhi is not insignificant. He terminated the life of a great soul at its peak, delivering the ultimate test to the greatness of a man who died with the name of god on his lips as gandhi himself fpretold....

...`` ...If I die with an assasins bullet with out the name of god on my lips, you can be sure that I was not a mahatma...``

Godse is critical to the greatness of gandhi, part of the scheme of things, and with out some kind of influence of gita on godses part, the greatness of gandhi would have been diminished....

The time and the manner one dies adds pognancey to the entire life...John F kennady today .....he would have been draged through the courts...

RSaxena . . . I thought we could discuss everything at chowk, so why are you being so diffident about matters?

Getting back to the question, I would think that both Gandhi and Godse, amongst many others, were following the inner call of their respective consciences. Whether these consciences were overtaken by reading scriptures, philosophies or whether these consciences were stuck between ego and angst is something that many can find out if they read Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. Or Joseph Heller. Or study histories of lifetimes of people they know intimately, not histories written by others of periods past.

Good article on chowk.com, asks a question many of us in India ask ourselves as we compare the cells at Yervada versus the cabins at the Aga Khan Palace nearby, in Poona?

Urstruly, harimau:

To add a contextual twist to the good vs. evil debate let me propose that in the modern day Hastinapur, India represents the Pandavas and Pakistan the Kauravas :))

Now who`s good and who`s evil? Whatever---- I thought teh article though pretty weak at a fundamental level, made for interesting reading!

STUKA!!!!!

I am in Delhi (ok, in Palam Vihar, Haryana....) till Dec 21, except for about ten days at the beginning of Dec when I`m in Bombay/Pune. Gimme call on 636 9395. Use the Harayana area code (look it up in book :-)). Talk soon!

++

Godse believed that Gandhi was responsible for the vivisection of his beloved motherland, had betrayed the Hindu nation and was the cause of the loss of life and honour of millions. Therefore, he deserved to die. There was no joy in this task for Godse. In killing Gandhi, he was just fulfilling what he believed to be his dharma. In his mind, he was following the same course of action that Krishna had asked Arjun to follow in the Geeta. Having accepted the role of the assassin, he did not let his personal feelings for Gandhi prevent him from carrying out his “dharma”.

So, who was following the message of Geeta in the true sense? Gandhi, Godse or both? If both, should holy scriptures play a role in morality?

++

Author makes the assumption that he knows that all decisions Gandhi made were made after deep study of Geeta only. This is not true. In his Autibiography he describes a dilemma resolution formula. You can find English translation of his autobiography at: http://www.mahatma.org.in/books/showbook.jsp?book=bg0001&link=bg&id=1&lang=en. This is the translation by Mahadev Desai they probably have tried to preserve pagination of original print edition. The formula is on pages 49-50.

Apart from vivisection there were issues which became bones of contention between newly created India and Pakistan. Gandhi seemed to be taking side of Pakistan`s side on some of the issues. For example the issue of dividing pre-partition Rupee fund. Gandhi kept on meddling on many issues and his stance appears to be formulated after applying the formula a little overzealously.

-ew

UrsTruly:

I agree that the author tries to build a case of ``good`` versus ``evil`` in the first case. That is because the Mahabharata itself portrays the ``good`` Pandavas against the ``evil`` Duryodhana. However, Krishna`s discourse is not based on good and evil. It is based on Karma and Dharma. The author does mention correctly that it was Arjun`s decision to be the commander of the Pandava army, and having made that decision, it was his duty to fight. He weakens his hypotheses by giving the background of the Mahabharata, which is missing in the actual discourse to Arjun.

The author`s interpretation of Gandhi and Godse is therefore closer to the essence of the Gita.

Very perceptive on your part though.

[Pandavas have exhausted all peaceful means of obtaining justice from their cousins, the Kauravas, who had refused to return to Pandavas their half of the kingdom. As a last resort, Krishna had himself gone to Kauravas as an ambassador of peace but they not only declined to give Pandavas their legitimate share but also refused Krishna’s suggested compromise of giving Pandavas a token of five villages, even five houses. Pandavas were left with no other choice but to fight for their right or give in to their cousins’ tyranny.]

Does the author claim that the Pandavas were in the right when they claimed a half-share of the kingdom?

Dhritharashtra, elder brother to Pandu, was blind but he was still the king, with Pandu acting as the Regent. The law of primogeniture says that Dhritharashtra was the king and it is only his first son Duryodana who had the right to succeed him. So where do the Pandavas have a right to a half-share in the kingdom? After all, the first-born Rama succeeded his father King Dasharath with Bharath, Lakshman, etc., acting as loyal brothers but not as claimants to any share in the kingdom. It was precisely for this reason that Kaikeyi demanded that her son Bharath should be king knowing that Bharath had no chance otherwise.

I think the entire Mahabharatha story is being wrongly interpreted with Pandavas being the good guys and the Kauravas the baddies. I don`t think the Pandavas collectively had one legal leg to stand on.