Modernity has been understood to denote everything enshrined in the principles

of progressive liberalism: the support for civil rights, a scientific temperament, a belief
in equality and a desire for progress towards a greater ideal.

In the orient, in general, and in India, in particular; ‘modernity’ has been

understood to mean anything concerning the occident. Blue jeans and pop music have
become the hallmarks of “western civilisation”, while materialism and unrestrained
absolute freedom are said to be ideas that have been borne as an outcome of the soft
power that the west holds over the east; and these are synonymously replaced with the
term ‘modernity’ with blithe disregard to finer issues than semantics.

Contrary, then, to this conventional understanding of modernity, if we are to

understand what Gandhi meant when he criticised this concept, we must draw some
careful distinctions between modernity and western civilisation.

When Gandhi formed his meticulous animadversion of modernity and

everything associated with modernity in his seminal work Hind Swaraj (as he himself
states, “This booklet [Hind Swaraj] is a severe condemnation of modern
civilization”)1, he wasn’t criticising western society or culture in any way, whatsoever.
In fact, it is interesting to see how influential some ideas from the west were to
Gandhi. One of the most popular aphorisms associated with Gandhian thought is the
belief in “turning the other cheek” this has been borrowed directly from the Sermon on
the Mount in the Bible where it is stated as follows:

“Ye have heard that it hath been said, an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth:
But I say unto you, that ye resist not evil: but whosoever shall smite thee on thy
right cheek, turn to him the other also.” (KJV Matthew 5:38-39)2

Each social or cultural critique is derived from a certain social milieu and the
vantage point that that social milieu offers. To the European imperialists, all non-
European civilisations contained savagery, barbaric proclivities and otherwise social,
cultural and economic backwardness from which succour could be provided only by
the efforts of the philanthropic Europeans. Gandhi, similarly, came from a certain
social milieu whereby his greatest influences were those which originated from the
subcontinent, varying from traditional Hindu and Jaina philosophies and philosophers
(most notably Shrimad Rajchandra3) to politicians who had little to do with in
ideological or philosophical grounding such as Gopal Krishna Gokhale.

However, what puts Gandhi at a much more advantageous position in

comparison to other contemporary thinkers is that Gandhi did not limit his purview to

1
Gandhi, MK. An Autobiography OR The Story Of My Experiments With Truth. ISBN 81-7229-008-X, p. 14
2
Gandhi, MK. What Jesus Means To Me. ISBN 81-7229-387-9, p. 3
3
Gandhi, MK. An Autobiography OR The Story Of My Experiments With Truth. ISBN 81-7229-008-X, p. 103-6
subcontinental influences. John Ruskin’s Unto This Last had a profound effect on
Gandhi’s world view. It was the bitter criticism of industrialist capitalism which drew
heavily on the Bible that Gandhi found in Ruskin’s anti-modernist ideas which formed
the impetus for him to begin an ashram in which everyone would be paid and would
work in equal measure.4 Gandhi had also formed an acquaintance with the Russian
author Leo Tolstoy.5 Tolstoy and Ruskin’s Christian ideals provided Gandhi with a
firm ground on which to lay his criticism of modernity while grounding his arguments
on Christian grounds. Along with these two, Henry David Thoreau’s ideas of standing
up for what you believe in and going to jail for one’s ideas as he stated in his essay
Civil Disobedience also influenced Gandhi as is evidenced in the spirit of the
movements that he began.6

These influences along with the entire work of What Jesus Means to Me provide
us with evidence for two claims on which we can begin working out what the
Gandhian critique of modernity actually incorporates. The first is that Gandhi was in
no way opposed to what may be called “western civilisation”. He drew heavily on the
ideas of equality and liberty, both of which find their roots in Christianity and
blossomed during the French Revolution. His love for tolerance and charity are similar
to Christian and Islamic ideals, neither of which he was ashamed of admitting.
Gandhian economics also draws heavily on western anarchism and volunteerism in
general and Tolstoyan anarchism in particular, especially the ideas that Tolstoy
elaborates on in The Kingdom of God is within You. The second claim that these
influences provide evidence for is that Gandhi’s vantage point when examining the
motley of ideologies he could have chosen from has a slight edge over the vantage
points of his compatriots because he drew so heavily from both, the orthodox and the
reformist.

Now that we have established what modernity certainly isn’t, the inevitable query
that remains to be answered is what modernity is. As an idea in itself, modernity can
be said to have taken initial shape in seventeenth or eighteenth century Western
Europe. The renaissance and the consequent intellectual enlightenment were certainly
factors that paved the way for the Industrial Revolution, which in turn led to the idea
of industry-driven capitalism to flourish. Philosophers, academics, sociologists and
social commentators from a smorgasbord of diverse backgrounds have criticised
modernity in their own way. Beginning with the Christian attack of the divide that
industries cause between man and nature; to Marx’s attack on the very basis for
capitalism that he finds utterly dehumanising in his seminal work Das Capital; to
Charles Dickens who narrated plaintive tales of childhoods wasted and the humanity
seized from ordinary people thanks to the evils of industry; to George Bernard Shaw,
4
Gandhi, MK. An Autobiography OR The Story Of My Experiments With Truth. ISBN 81-7229-008-X, p. 106
5
ibid., p .106
6
Gandhi, MK. Duty of Disobeying Laws, Indian Opinion. September, 1907.
Hannah Arendt, John Steinbeck and so on and so forth; the criticism of industry-driven
capitalism had been steady for the one-and-a-half century between the Industrial
Revolution and Gandhi authoring Hind Swaraj. To add to the list, of course, the two
writers who influenced Gandhi most extensively: Tolstoy and Ruskin. Gandhi even
mentions the unoriginal nature of his argument several times throughout the work.

However, to find out what the Gandhian perspective on modernity is, we must go
back to Ruskin. Ruskin’s Unto This Last was one of the three greatest factors that, in
Gandhi’s own words, influenced him. This was also one of the first books outside of
the mandatory textbooks that he read.7 The three points of teaching that, by his own
admission, influenced Gandhi the most are worth mentioning at this point8:

1. The good of the individual is contained in the good of all.

2. The lawyer’s work has the same value as a barber’s inasmuch as all have the same
right of earning their livelihood from their work.
3. That a life of labour, i.e., the life of the tiller of the soil and the handicraftsman, is
the life worth living.

Using the latter two of these principles (since, as Gandhi says, he found the first
principle to be a piece of axiomatic a priori knowledge), Gandhi began a volunteer-run
communal farm in South Africa called the Phoenix Settlement in 1904.

We can witness the first critique of modernity in Hind Swaraj as the point at
which Gandhi ostensibly criticises technological developments as alienating human
beings and sacrificing human spirit and labour at the altar of corporeal pleasure and
material progress, and simultaneously provides us with the finest example of doing
what one ought to do instead of simply haranguing the masses on moral or religious
values. The Phoenix Settlement is an example of his determination to actually make
his philosophy into a practicable activity instead of a rant from an ivory tower.

After contrasting many aspects of modern civilisation with that which they have
replaced, Gandhi declares this configuration of modern civilisation to be immoral and
irreligious and lacking in humanity:

“...formerly, men worked in the open air only as much as they liked. Now
thousands of workmen meet together and for the sake of maintenance work in
factories or mines. Their condition is worse than that of beasts. They are obliged
to work, at the risk of their lives, at most dangerous occupations, for the sake of
millionaires... Formerly, men were made slaves under physical compulsion. Now
they are enslaved by temptation of money and of the luxuries that money can
buy. There are now diseases of which people never dreamt before, and an army
7
Gandhi, MK. An Autobiography OR The Story Of My Experiments With Truth. ISBN 81-7229-008-X, p. 359
8
ibid., p. 360
 of doctors is engaged in finding out their cures, and so hospitals have increased...
This civilization takes note neither of morality nor of religion. Its votaries calmly
state that their business is not to teach religion. Some even consider it to be a
superstitious growth. Others put on the cloak of religion, and prate about
morality. But, after twenty years' experience, I have come to the conclusion that
immorality is often taught in the name of morality... [This] Civilization seeks to
increase bodily comforts, and it fails miserably even in doing so.”9

It is important to note that Gandhi here is criticising not only modernity and its
symptoms, he is also furnishing us with a fine critique of what the European
imperialists hold to be “civilised” society. This “civilisation” is judged by its own
members according to the corporeal and material satiation that it provides. According
to him; the bleak, miserable lives led by the subjects of such a civilisation are
indicators of the depravity of this system; and the lack of substantial dissent against
this system stems from the fact that anyone raised in such a system would deem it
normal unless they were provided with an independent, individual incentive to
contemplate on the motley of deranged aspects of this type of a society.

THE “SYMPTOMS” OF MODERNITY

Gandhi considered some aspects of development to be symptomatic of the

normative claim towards modernity that he has established so far. These aspects are
the basis for the formation of the perspectives on modern civilisation and they are
responsible for the weak internal response that the subcontinent has provided (or failed
to provide) to British imperialism. He talks about these aspects in chapters VI through
XII of Hind Swaraj. While he holds these to be the reasons for the British hold over
the subcontinent persisting, they can also be taken to be the “symptoms” of modernity.
They are:

1. Mesmerising (Ch. VI and VII): Indians tend to think of modern civilisation as

being something to strive and aim for. The charm of industry-driven capitalism
and the entailing responsibility of entrepreneurship are enthralling for a majority
of the youth. This was true at the beginning of the previous century and it still
holds true today, a hundred and twenty years later. Even the most religious
organisations today tend to function as benefactors of their patron who in turn
have a strong empirical possibility of being a section of the moneyed class. The
little consolation that is provided by the British eliminating the small-time
thuggees such as Bhils and the Pindaris is objected to by Gandhi by saying that
British aid in such matters has emasculated our own countrymen and further

9
Gandhi, MK. Hind Swaraj OR Indian Home Rule. ISBN 81-7229-070-5, p. 32
 incensed the fascination with the cult of the White Man (and, consequently,
modernity) for the indigenous peoples of our nation. This implies that the native
Indian has lost the will to fight for himself and has begun holding the European in
a brighter light than his native brothers and sisters.0
2. Irreligion (Ch. VIII): Gandhi accuses modernity of inculcating values of
irreligion in its subjects. The popular belief within the paradigm of modernity is
that those who do not pursue material satiation are indolent reprobates; whereas
every great religion from the Abrahamic traditions, to the ancient Persian plethora
of beliefs, to the pagan or scriptural religions of India and China teach their
practitioners to be wary of material pursuits and to keep spiritual gratification at
the forefront of their religious beliefs. Gandhi’s religion, therefore, should be
understood to be very different from the populist organised religion. The popular
adage of “Work is Worship” obviously sums up his beliefs succinctly.
3. Railways (Ch. IX): Controversially, Gandhi was also opposed to the popular
logistical marvel that was the Railways. According to Gandhi, Railways only
helped the British strengthen their own empire and further their goal of
subjugating the subcontinent completely. Gandhi’s arguments against the
Railways were threefold: the spread of diseases, the deterioration in trade and the
psychological toll. Railways help spread disease by providing easy transportation
and expose farmers and handymen to alien pathogens. Tradesmen are motivated to
sell their goods and services for greater profit in distant areas thus causing a
vacuum for those goods and services in their own villages and eventually leading
to famine. What was meant to be long and arduous in pilgrimages has become
easy and comfortable thanks to the Railways. Yet again, modernity has helped
emasculate our people and deprive us of what makes us human, thus insidiously
eroding our will to oppose British imperialism.
4. Divide and Rule (Ch. X): Gandhi explains patiently in this chapter that the idea
of “one nation, one religion” has never been practiced in this subcontinent, even
before the advent of the Mohammedans. Moreover, there is no nation in the world
which can claim to be of homogenous religious composition. “The introduction of
foreigners does not necessarily destroy the nation, they merge in it”, he boldly
states (p. 44). The enmity between the Hindus and the Muslims is an invention of
the British which they have shrewdly utilised to create acute divisions between the
two communities. Gandhi also points out that there are disputes between Shaivites
and Vaishnavites but no one appears to suggest that these two communities belong
to two different nations. This should prove that the communal tensions are a
foreign invention and not any inherent tensions between the communities in the
subcontinent. Gandhi goes so far as to point out that a human being’s life is just as
valuable as a cow’s. It is then pointless for conflicts to occur on the issue of cow
protection. In his own words, “...the only method I know of protecting the cow is
 that I should approach my Mahomedan brother and urge him for the sake of the
country to join me in protecting her. If he would not listen to me I should let the
cow go for the simple reason that the matter is beyond my ability. If I were
overfull of pity for the cow, I should sacrifice my life to save her but not take my
brother's. This, I hold, is the law of our religion.” (p. 46). Gandhi concludes by
urging his fellow Hindus to follow the path of Ahimsa when dealing with their
fellow human beings, no matter what religion the latter subscribe to and practice.
He would later reiterate these strong beliefs on communal unity against the British
in his later works.10
5. Lawyers (Ch. XI): The final two components of modernity and the final two arms
of British dominion according to Gandhi are Lawyers and Doctors. The Lawyer,
while in principle attempts to mediate during quarrels, in practice only tries to
achieve the betterment of his own party at the expense of the opposing party.
Instead of resolving conflict then, the lawyers only serve to further intensify it. To
add salt to the proverbial wound, they suck dry the poor of their wealth by taking it
all in the name of legal fees. In this way, lawyers not only uphold the laws of the
imperialists but also scavenge on the hard-earned fruit of labour of the colonised
natives. To get rid of British rule, says Gandhi, the people of this country must
cease to plead justice with the courts.
6. Doctors (Ch. XII): Similarly, Gandhi accuses doctors of debilitating the people
by offering up medicines to cure any disease or affliction that may arise whereas
disease and affliction are the body’s way of saying that the present way of life is
hazardous. If one overeats, he says, one may find a pill for indigestion; but
indigestion is nature’s way of saying that overeating is harmful and therefore
should be avoided. Moreover, modern medicine promotes vivisection and the
medical preparations in allopathy contain animal fat or “spurious liquors” as he
calls them, both of which are explicitly forbidden in both Hinduism and Islam (p.
54).

These six aspects of the British hold on India can be said to be the five pillars on
which Gandhi’s critique of modernity stands. However, it is noteworthy that while
Gandhi’s opposition to these aspects of modernity was at the forefront of his
philosophy; he, at no point in his life, insisted on boycotting the use of these aspects of
modernity until, at least, the beginning of the Swadeshi Movement. Indeed, throughout
his life, he kept on using trains even after his acerbic condemnation of the attery
caused by the railways. And, as he mentions in the text:

10
Gandhi, MK. Constructive Programme (Its Meaning & Place). ISBN 81-7229-067-5, Ch. 1 (Communal Unity).
 “...I am not aiming at destroying railways or hospitals, though I would certainly
welcome their natural destruction. Neither railways nor hospitals are a test of a
high and pure civilization. At best they are a necessary evil.”11

FREEDOM FROM MODERNITY

Gandhi discovered, after careful examination of the opinions held by Indians as

regards the British rule, that what we really require as a country is not freedom from
British rule, but rather freedom from modernity. To this end, he brings the British
parliamentary system under the same comprehensive category as the other aspects of
modernity. He called the British parliament a “sterile woman” and a “prostitute”; the
former because it is incapable of doing any good by its own and the latter because it
requires “outside pressure” to do anything at all. Here, he appears to be supporting a
meritocratic system of democracy with more efficient filters in place to sieve out a
more philanthropic or less nefarious class of people who may be given the right to
rule. Gandhi’s argument is built on the idea that much of what is wrong with the
parliament is that its members are incapable of leading the masses. The MPs elected
almost always turn out to either be incompetent or have their own personal agendas
which they intend to fulfil. To add insult to injury, he declares that elected officials of
the government lack both honesty and a conscience: the very things that would make
parliament functional. In his own words, then:

“If the money and the time wasted by Parliament were entrusted to a few good
men, the English nation would be occupying today a much higher platform.”12

MODERNITY AND RATIONALISM

Modernity, according to Gandhi, lacks religiousness. It replaces morality with a

scientific temperament. Gandhi did not support rationalism, per se. Famously, after the
Bihar earthquake of 1934, he stated that the earthquake was a divine reprimand for the
sin of untouchability. In response to this, Tagore stated in an article that such
“unfortunate, unscientific comments” led to us (the admirers of Gandhi) “...feel[ing]
profoundly hurt when any words from his mouth may emphasize the elements of
unreason in those very minds -- unreason which is a source of all blind powers that
drive us against freedom and self-respect.” 13 In his rejoinder to Tagore’s article,
Gandhi stated that “Visitations like droughts, floods, earthquakes and the like, though

11
Gandhi, MK. Hind Swaraj OR Indian Home Rule. ISBN 81-7229-070-5, p. 14
12
ibid., p. 28.
13
Tagore, Rabindranath. “The Bihar Earthquake”, Harijan. 16th February, 1934.
they seem to have only physical origins, are, for me, somehow connected with man’s
morals.”14

This dichotomy between reason and superstition can be best understood if we try
and see Gandhi as what he actually was rather than what he claimed to be. He wasn’t a
rationalist like Tagore or Nehru15, both of whom stated their displeasure at Gandhi’s
statements regarding the Bihar earthquake. Gandhi, unlike them, was a pragmatist to
the core; what some would describe as a “politician”. That keen, shrewd sense of what
was to be done, as opposed to what must be achieved, was what distinguished him as a
pragmatist. This does not mean that he wasn’t a visionary, at any rate. Rather, this
caused his philosophy to become a multi-layered ideology which functioned on several
different levels. On the pragmatic level, his ideas functioned as the fulcrum on which
many-a mass movement would operate and swing towards Swaraj; and on a more
idealistic level, he displayed an aspiration for a quintessential ne plus ultra vision of a
utopia. This is the reason he has received criticism of being too idealistic and being too
flexible in his ideology simultaneously from different ends of the socio-political
spectrum.

For Gandhi, then, rationalism was not only an alien concept deserving of scorn
for being an alien concept to the subcontinent; rather, to him it was a tool used by the
imperialists to justify colonialism. His response, rather than being a counter-rationalist
perspective, was an outright rejection of rationalism. Even if his ideas on cause and
effect were proven to be wrong, he said, they would have served him and that’s all that
he desires.16 The pragmatist here shines through gloriously.

Gandhi’s opposition to rationalism, then, shouldn’t be seen as a part of his

critique of modernity. Rather, it can be rejoinder to modernity in that, one of concepts
that modernity has furnished the British with is rationalism; and this rationalism is a
weapon for the British to cast a supercilious look on the occident and ostentatiously
lay claim to their intellectual superiority over the natives.

Gandhi also declares boldly in Hind Swaraj that “The English have not taken
India; we have given it to them. They are not in India because of their strength, but
because we keep them.”17 Equating this to his rejection of rationalism and scientific
temper, we find that what Gandhi is essentially saying is that British rule didn’t come
into existence because they are somehow superior thanks to their cunning and their
scientific temper; but because Indians lost touch with their own religion and became
morally degraded.
14
Gandhi, MK. “Superstitions vs. Faith” (Rejoinder to “The Bihar Earthquake”), Harijan. 28th February, 1934.
15
Nehru, Jawaharlal. Toward Freedom (An Autobiography). ISBN 978-0-19-562361-1, ch. XLIV: Impasse and
Earthquake.
16
Gandhi, MK. “Superstitions vs. Faith” (Rejoinder to “The Bihar Earthquake”), Harijan. 28th February, 1934.
17
Gandhi, MK. Hind Swaraj OR Indian Home Rule. ISBN 81-7229-070-5, p. 35
AN ALTERNATE CIVILISATION
Since modernity is now symptomatic of an imperialist civilisation; what, then,
does Gandhi suggest as a replacement for what he considers to be the baseness and
crudeness of modernity?

The answer is certainly not conservative or conformist tradtitionalism. Gandhi

escaped the trap of anachronistic occident-bashing by employing another of his great
traits that have been mentioned above: he drew inspiration from his enemies and the
west. He did not limit his arsenal of ideological weaponry to that which he learnt from
ancient Hindu scriptures – or from scriptures of any religion, for that matter. He drew
heavily on Ruskin and Tolstoy, yes; but he also drew on the ideas of his opponents.
For instance, for Gandhi, the locus of ethics is not the communitarian unity that is
taught by traditionalism; rather, the locus of ethics lies in the individual. To quote
Gandhi himself, “The individual is the supreme consideration” 18 and “Ultimately it is
the individual who is the unit”19. Unlike the modernist narrative, though, the
individual, for Gandhi, is not born with natural rights; rather, he earns his rights by
doing his duty, as is taught by the Gita. Therefore, the individual is of supreme
importance to Gandhi, just like modernity dictates; but he does not automatically
deserve anything just by virtue of being an individual human being with his own
thoughts and beliefs; he has to work in order to earn those rights rather than fight to
defend his rights. Gandhi is, therefore, relentlessly individualistic and yet, somehow,
more communitarian than modernity could tolerate. Thus, Gandhi came up with a
unique replacement for both traditionalism and modernity and this effectively explains
why he is accused of being too conservative as well as being too liberal by different
people.

However, these are just snippets of what he believes to be the truth that
contradicts the narrative of modernity. What does he propose as an alternative to
modernity in the long term? Gandhi sees modernity as a disease and the cure to this
disease is, in his opinion, moral righteousness which will ultimately come as a result of
disenchantment from the highly flawed narrative that has been cast by the supporters
of industry-driven capitalism. In Hind Swaraj itself, Gandhi tells us the importance of
learning from our ancestors and inculcating in ourselves that meticulous distinction
between the truth and the fact.20 According to him:

18
Gandhi, MK. Young India. 13th November, 1924.
19
Gandhi, MK. Harijan. 28th July, 1946.
20
Gandhi draws the distinction between “the truth” and “the facts” in a letter to Rabindranath Tagore, where
he talks about the desires of flesh being facts (not truth); and that truth concerns what OUGHT TO be and not
what IS. This belief finds resonance in the dichotomy of “is” and “ought to” found in the works of Hume and
Kant. I couldn’t find a proper citation or reference for the original letter but an approximation of this belief can
be said to pervade the corpus of his work.
 “Our ancestors...set a limit to our indulgences. They saw that happiness was
largely a mental condition. A man is not necessarily happy because he is rich, or
unhappy because he is poor... Observing all this, our ancestors dissuaded us from
luxuries and pleasures. We have managed with the same kind of plough as
existed thousands of years ago... We have had no system of life-corroding
competition. Each followed his own occupation...and charged a regulation wage.
It was not that we did not know how to invent machinery, but our forefathers
knew that, if we set our hearts after such things, we would become slaves and
lose our moral fibre. They, therefore, after due deliberation decided that we
should only do what we could with our hands and feet [...]. The common people
lived independently and followed their agricultural occupation. They enjoyed
true Home Rule.”21

In a similar vein, he talks of such areas where the British have so far had no
interest to spread their rule to within the subcontinent:

“And where this cursed modern civilization has not reached, India remains as it
was before. The inhabitants of that part of India will very properly laugh at your
newfangled notions. The English do not rule over them, nor will you ever rule
over them. Those in whose name we speak we do not know, nor do they know
us. I would certainly advise you and those like you who love the motherland to
go into the interior that has yet been not polluted by the railways and to live there
for six months; you might then be patriotic and speak of Home Rule.”22

The alternative to modernity can, therefore, be found in those parts of India

where modernity has not touched the lives of the commonfolk yet: the tribal villages in
the hearts of the forests or on and around the mountains, the pastoral communities and
other villages where the British have not cast their clandestine eyes yet. In the lives of
the pagans and the nature worshippers who live as parts of nature and as fellow
humans rather than conquerors of nature and in perpetual competition with their fellow
men, the appropriate response to modernity can be found. Or in the lives of our
ancestors who led similarly simple yet arguably much more complete lives, the
appropriate response to the sorry excuse for civilisation that imperialism propagates
can be found.

It is, therefore, our responsibility as Indians not to oppose British rule because it
was a rule of the foreigners over a foreign race in the latter’s own homes; rather, to
oppose modernity which made us fragile and which made us lose our pride and our
knowledge of morality and religion, and which is, ultimately, responsible for our
(then) present condition of being ruled by a foreign race.

21
Gandhi, MK. Hind Swaraj OR Indian Home Rule. ISBN 81-7229-070-5, p. 57-58
22
ibid., p.58
 As for the British themselves, Gandhi prophesises that they, too, will ultimately
get rid of modernity from their nation as a whole. He sees the British as worshippers of
their newspapers.23 They are taught what to think by the government indirectly by
dishonest newspapers and they change their government every seven years. However,
this is a change only in name since, as mentioned before; their government serves only
to benefit itself and not the people of the nation as a whole. Gandhi does not
particularly elaborate on a European solution to the problem of modernity. He simply
points out that all is wrong with Occident today is only because of modernity and not
because of any inherent fault in the culture of the Occident.

Criticism
23
Gandhi, MK. Hind Swaraj OR Indian Home Rule. ISBN 81-7229-070-5, p.29
 The Gandhian perspective of modernity can be criticised on many different
accounts and from several different perspectives.

One of the most famous counterarguments against the argument against

modernity (and industrialisation) is given by the economist and philosopher of the
Austrian school FA Hayek. This argument can be applied to the Gandhian critique of
modernity as well. According to Hayek, the redeeming factor for the Industrial
Revolution is the fact that people criticise the Industrial Revolution for bringing about
a great detriment in the well-being or prosperity of the masses. He believes that we
see, in the eighteenth century, “an increasing awareness of facts which before had
passed unnoticed”.24 Hayek believes that before the Industrial Revolution, everyone
lived in abject poverty. Since it was so commonplace, nobody complained about it.
Moreover, everybody expected a similar fate of grinding poverty for their descendants.
The fantastic amounts of wealth that the Industrial Revolution brought forth then made
people impatient with any remaining pockets of poverty. To quote Hayek himself:

“...the very increase of wealth and well-being which had been achieved raised
standards and aspirations. What for ages had seemed a natural and inevitable
situation, or even as an improvement upon the past [i.e., inevitable poverty],
came to be regarded as incongruous with the opportunities which the new age
appeared to offer. Economic suffering both became more conspicuous and
seemed less justified, because general wealth was increasing faster than ever
before.”25

It was, therefore, only after the Industrial Revolution that people began to realise
that a prosperous life with happiness and material wealth is possible. Thus, in the
eighteenth century, there wasn’t a sudden increase in poverty or decrease in wealth;
rather, there was a sudden massive increase in the possibility of acquiring wealth and
that of living a comfortable life. To add to this formula for material well-being, there
was also a subsequent massive increase in the awareness of the common folk of the
fact that they, too, can lead a life with material comfort. Nobody complained (and
criticised) before the eighteenth century then, because there was nothing to strive for
and, therefore, nothing to complain about.

Gandhi’s response to this would quite simply be that material luxuries do not
make up for spiritual corruption. Moreover, the sole achievement that corporeal
pleasures can boast of is that they create a metaphysical divorce between a man and his
spiritual goals. While Hayek’s arguments may stand against the Marxist view that
defends the workers’ rights; against Gandhi’s spiritual criticism of modernity, or
indeed, against any religious or spiritual criticism of modernity that talks of the

24
Hayek, FA. Capitalism and the Historians. ISBN 978-0226320724, p. 18.
25
ibid., p. 18.
divorce between man and spirituality or man and nature (such as that of Tolstoy),
Hayek’s arguments fall flat. Gandhi has talked of the importance of sacrificing
material satiation for spiritual gain over26 and over again27. Hayek does not concern
himself with the spiritual expense of modernity at all. For Gandhi, the oppression of
the poor is just another example of the expense of modernity.

In modern times, a popular opinion regarding opinions has been that morality and
ethics are more or less relative. Therefore, opinions, in general, tend to be relative.
Keeping this in mind, thinkers are today not judged according to how “good” or “bad”
their ideas are (since “good” and “bad” are both relative); rather, they are judged on
the basis of their consistency. If their ideas go well with each other and they possess a
visionary outlook that can be said to be practicable and the philosopher who holds
them can be said to be a good thinker. Gandhi had a strong proclivity towards
contradicting himself. One of the strongest points in favour of modernity is the
demand for civil rights or the rights of the oppressed and those who have been
downtrodden. Women’s rights and feminism are, therefore, important aspects of the
ideas that modernity has introduced to the world. Gandhi held remarkably progressive
views against the orthodox practices of female “purity” 28, Purdah29, dowry30 and
widow remarriage31 (against the concept of the first, against the next two and in
support of the fourth). However, things begin to get a little hazy when we see that
Gandhi held some quaint views about molestation and rape, to wit:

“It is physically impossible to violate a woman against her will.  The outrage
takes place only when she gives way to fear or does not realize her moral
strength.  If she cannot meet the assailant’s physical might, her purity will give
her the strength to die before he succeeds in violating her, for example, Sita.” 32

Such opinions would cause outrage today since this quote essentially places the
onus of blame for rape or molestation on the woman’s weakness. This does not require
any elaboration, it is in itself, a remarkably deranged belief, but it becomes even
stranger when we contrast it with Gandhi’s otherwise progressive views on women’s
26
“If modern civilisation stands for all this [material and sensuous pleasure], and I have understood it to do so,
I call it satanic.” – Gandhi, MK. Young India. 17 March, 1927; p. 85.
27
Gandhi, MK. Hind Swaraj OR Indian Home Rule. ISBN 81-7229-070-5, p. 38.
28
“Why is there all this morbid anxiety about female purity?  Have women any say in the matter of male
purity?  Female or male purity cannot be superimposed from without.  It is a matter of evolution from within
and therefore of individual self effort.” – Gandhi, MK. Young India. 25th November, 1926.
29
“Chastity cannot be protected by the surrounding wall of the Purdah.  It must grow from within and it must
be capable of withstanding every unsought temptation” – Gandhi, MK. Young India. 3rd February, 1927
30
“Demanding dowry is akin to discrediting womanhood.” – Gandhi, MK. Young India. 21st June, 1928. “The
abolition of caste will lead to the abolition of dowry” – Gandhi, MK. Harijan. 23rd May, 1936.
31
“Widowhood imposed by religion or custom is an unbearable yoke and defiles the home by secret vice and
degrades religion.  In order to save Hinduism, enforced widowhood must be ridden.  Child widows must be
duly and well married and not remarried.  They were never really married” – Gandhi, MK. Young India. 5th
August, 1926.
32
Gandhi, MK. Harijan. 14th January, 1940.
rights and it begins to show the gaping holes caused by contradictions within Gandhi’s
philosophy and questions begin to arise on the validity of the Gandhian critique of
modernity.

Similarly, Gandhi’s views on birth control33, contraception34 and sterilisation

would sound anachronistic today, as his belief was strictly grounded in the sanctity of
life and the duty of every man and woman to procreate. While this might sound like
another sturdy argument grounded in spirituality, the question one must ask is, “what
about sterile people then?” Are they somehow lesser humans simply because they are
incapable of bearing children? Or are they just anomalies of nature? Gandhi’s beliefs
in birth control were also guided by his belief in the importance of Brahmcharya or
chastity through self-control. He believed that pleasures of the flesh were detrimental
to the moral fibre of society. This, again, could be said to be a regressive belief but it
does not contradict his critique of modernity in any way.

However, the weakness of Gandhi’s support for women’s rights is exposed by his
opinion on widow remarriage. While he supported remarriage as quoted above, he
supported only the remarriage of child widows. In the case of adult women, Gandhi
advocated them following the dharma of a widowed woman instead of remarrying.35

Such regressive stances when it comes to women’s rights have led to a

substantial proportion of the liberal populace becoming disenchanted with Gandhi’s
ideas on modernity as a whole. The outmoded sections of his beliefs are considered to
be the bane of his philosophy. However, in his defence, it stands to reason that a few
regressive thoughts from a man torn between the pragmatic and the idealistic, and the
traditionalist and the revisionist would be understandable.

Another feature of the regressive stances of Gandhi’s alternative civilisation

comes from his opinions on caste and untouchability. While Gandhi was a vehement
opponent of untouchability, his opinions on caste were infamously not so progressive.
He believed the varṇas to be “fundamental, natural, and essential”36, to be a fluid
system where one person could change their varṇa depending on which varṇa’s
characteristics were predominant in them. To him, this system helped make the society
far more egalitarian. The Ambedkarite accusation on Gandhi has always been that he
held the caste system to be an essential feature of Hinduism and refuses to do away

33
“It is immoral to seek escape from the consequences of one’s acts. Moral results can only be produced by
moral restraints.  All other restraints defeat the very purpose for which they are intended” – Gandhi, MK.
Young India. 12th March, 1925.
34
“The use of contraceptives kills the desire to exercise self restraint... The purpose of human creation was
wholly different from that of the satisfaction of animal wants” – Gandhi, MK. Key to Health. ISBN 81-7229-040-
3, p. 34.
35
Gandhi, MK. Navajivan. 21st February, 1926.
36
Gandhi, MK. Young India. 8th December, 1920.
with it. Instead, he opposes only untouchability37, as is made clear in his rejoinder to
Ambedkar’s Annihilation of Caste. Ambedkar wanted to make it clear that Hinduism
is a “veritable chamber of horrors” for the Dalits whereas Gandhi believed that the
ancient Hindu Varṇāshramadharma38 was a perfect system that did not propagate
untouchability at all. Rather, it helped promote egalitarianism and a common work
ethic in all and sundry.

Whatever be the truth, the fact remains that Gandhi and Ambedkar had a fall out
when it came to discussing the caste system. The perception of Gandhi as a man who
opposed the dismantling of the entire caste system (believing it to be a dismantling of
the Hindu religion itself) has led to a general feeling of distrust that has pervaded the
lower castes (as is popularly known in the derision amongst the Dalits with regard to
the patronising term used by Gandhi: “Harijans”). This, in turn, has led to a thinning
of support for Gandhi amongst the dalits and, indeed, an anti-Gandhi feeling to foment
amongst liberals and dalits alike who see Gandhi as a greatly divisive figure.

If their arguments are to be accepted, again, like the feminists and the idea of
women’s rights, this too results in the ground upon which Gandhi’s critique of
modernity is built becoming shaky because of the contradictions that exist in the rest
of his philosophy. The point to remember here is that women’s rights and Dalit rights
both owe their modern-day incarnations to imperialism and modernity. It is, therefore,
difficult for someone to criticise modern civilisation and simultaneously profess to
believe in the annihilation of the caste system or the profess support for women’s
rights. This makes it difficult, then, for a substantial section of the liberal and
progressive intelligentsia to comfortably accept the Gandhian vision of an alternative
civilisation – or even the Gandhian critique of modern civilisation, for that matter.

The only thing that can be said in defence of Gandhi in response to these
arguments is that Gandhi was a man torn between lofty idealism and hard pragmatism
or a desire to revert back to the traditional methods of the ancestors and a recognition
of the futility of attempting to expunge the ills from these regressive philosophies
without purging the philosophies as well (which would be next to impossible). On the
one hand, he attempts to destroy the ills of untouchability and discrimination but on
the other hand, he supports the very institutions that enable these ills to exist because
he believes that they are vital for the society’s functioning as a whole.

37
Gandhi, MK. A Vindication of Caste, Harijan. 15th August, 1936.
38
Gandhi, MK. Young India. 27th October, 1927.