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Curtain Raiser for a Mahatma: The Lost Truths of Gandhi by Abhijeet Singh
Peeling an onion is already a dying metaphor, or I would've used it. Now, this is not a place to quote Hazrat Amir Khusrow but I'm aching to do so. In a rather famous kehmukarni (South Asian equivalent of a riddle), Khusrow says:
barsa baras wa des mein aave
muh se muh laga ras piyaave
wa khaatir mai kharche daam
ae sakhi, saajan? na sakhi,
aam
(He visits my town once a year.
He fills my mouth with kisses and nectar.
I spend all my money on him
Who, girl, your man?
No, a mango.)
This poem will never be the same for you, and I am sorry to Khusrow, but Mr. Gandhi happens to be that Mango of South Asian History. A rather flawed and infamous one. Not savoury or sweet, under the saintly mien of his who-knows-why-it-was-bestowed-title 'Mahatma' (which translates to ‘great-souled’). Gujarat High Court, in 2016, responding to a RTI query confirmed it was given by 'Gurudev' Tagore. Dr. Ambedkar believed otherwise, as told to the BBC in an interview, available on Youtube. Author of Animal Farm, George Orwell, in his 1949 essay Reflections on Gandhi, warned that "saints should always be judged guilty until they are proved innocent". Nevertheless, the progressive Hindi novelist Premchand was a Gandhian. The Ramon-Magsasay winner, Ravish Kumar, is a Gandhian. Above all, Martin Luther King went on to say that “Christ showed us the way and Gandhi in India showed it could work”. Clearly, our fascination with heroes goes beyond our own imagination. Even if their heroics are below sea level. See level. C-level. Pee level. Precisely, Medieval. Okay, I will stop.
Resembling my style of writing, the kind of life Mr. Gandhi led was also a failed struggle to put things together. A rigorous exercise between affairs and scandals of all sorts. A mishmash of repressed sexuality and diabolically aged ideas that shaped his gendered sensibility. It is then a surprise that these many intriguing facets of the most influential, if not important, figure of our history remains a taboo for those who advocate his legacy. Millions of books, essays and writings are published on his life and times. Films and documentaries have been shot. Exhibitions have been held. Seminars have been conducted. As a matter of fact, every year it so happens that in any given literary festival in India, there's at least one book on Mr. Gandhi that is launched. Half of them are written by Ramchandra Guha. Hell knows when that will stop. Historians are obsessed with him and politicians are still figuring out which side to take. Somewhere Godse is still not happy. Mr. Gandhi remains a favourite and I am here to tell you why this favouritism might not be good for your civic sense.
In the years 1924, 1936 and 1938, Gandhi had 'nocturnal emissions', or Wet Dreams if you may. The disgusted celibate meticulously recorded these seminal discharges and publicised them. These 'imperfections' were in his opinion the reason for him to be falling short to achieve the kind of piety one would require to battle with rising communalism. Yes, you read that right. Him getting aroused was somehow the reason why Bengal was burning in the Hindu-Muslim riots around the time of Partition. Conquering his phallus was supposed to be his victory over Mohammad Ali Jinnah. Apparently, he believed it to an extent of cynicism. Carnal desire was considered to be an obstacle in the way of 'greater' good i.e. devoting one's energy to the progress of a nation. Sex was only an act to impregnate women and produce children and not an activity of pleasure. His biographer Ramchandra Guha writes in Gandhi: The Years That Changed the World, 1914-1948: