'I Sat And Shivered': What Gandhi Wrote About His 'Humiliating' Night In South Africa

The June 7, 1893 train incident that took place at the Pietermaritzburg train station in South Africa, is often cited as the turning point in the life of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi.

The much-cited and equally dramatised incident has been documented not just in the official records of the Government of India, but even by the Mahatma himself in his autobiography - My Experiments with Truth.

Wikipedia

In the June of that year, the London-trained, Gujarati-speaking lawyer from Porbandar was on his way to Pretoria to settle a dispute pertaining to his client Dada Abdullah Jhaveri.

"I sat and shivered"

Despite having the tickets for the First Class, Gandhi was thrown off the compartment, which, the authorities claimed, was reserved only for the white.

¡°My overcoat was in my luggage, but I did not dare to ask for it lest I should be insulted again, so I sat and shivered... There was no light in the room,¡± Gandhi wrote in his autobiography. In what undoubtedly hints that it could have been at this point that the thoughts of fighting for his rights were born.

2nd October Gandhi Jayanti Holiday | Photo: TOI Bangalore

Gandhi goes on to say - "Should I fight for my rights and go back to India or should I go on to Pretoria without minding the insults... It would be cowardice to run back to India without fulfilling my obligation."

The humiliation during the night spent at the Waiting Hall of the empty station led to the mobilisation of Indians in Durban and Gandhi formed the Natal Indian Congress.

Protests by the white community

Though he returned to India in 1896, he was called by the Natal Indian Congress to Durban. The Indian High Commission in Pretoria notes that there were -massive protests by the white community - who did not allow Gandhi to disembark the ship.

"The ship was kept in quarantine for three weeks and when he was finally allowed to come ashore he was attacked by a mob and brutally beaten," it says. Gandhi then went on to form the Ambulance Corps of around 1100 strength with a motive to support the British in the Anglo-Boer War of 1899-1902. He hoped that that supporting the British could mean a better life for Indians in Transvaal and South Africa. He was, however, disappointed.

TOI

Landed him in jail

In the year 1902, after a brief return to India, Gandhi formed the Transvaal British Indian Association in Johannesburg. His refusal to leave Transvaal landed him in jail for two months.

This was the first of his four terms in jail at the Old Fort Prison Complex in South Africa. Besides this, Gandhi was imprisoned in Volksrust [1908], Pretoria [1909] and Volksrust [1913].

"In 1910, Mahatma Gandhi founded the Tolstoy Farm on the outskirts of Johannesburg to prepare satyagrahis... In 1912, the South African Native National Congress [pre-cursor to ANC] was formed with John Dube," the High Commission in South Africa notes.

Rare Photo of Indian Freedom Fighter Mahatma Gandhi | funalive

Launched Volkrust Satyagraha

In the year 1913, Gandhi launched the famous Volkrust Satyagraha, protesting against the humiliating pass laws, disobeying which had landed him in jail. It was here that Gandhi, as well as Kasturba Gandhi, were imprisoned again.

Ultimately, however, the Indian Relief Act was passed, thrashing the discriminatory pass laws. The professional stint, for which Gandhi, the lawyer, landed in South Africa in 1883, stretched to 21 long years, that shaped the experiments which he once again unveiled against the British rule in India upon his arrival at Mumbai on January 9, 1915.