ABSTRACT
Mohandas Gandhi pioneered the strategies of nonviolent civil disobedience to achieve national independence and social reform for India. Gandhi was born on October 2, 1869, the son of the prime minister of Purbandhar, a small, western Indian state. Gandhi was married at 13, then sent to England by his family in 1888 to study law. Discouraged after several years of activism that produced few results and more riots and arrests, Gandhi resigned his presidency of the Indian National Congress in 1934 and began devoting his energies to helping the poor. He resumed his campaign with the outbreak of World War II, refusing cooperation with the British without a promise of independence for India. Mohandas Gandhi created one of the most powerful nonviolent movements for independence and social reform. His example inspired both other independence movements in European colonies and social reform movements in the United States and elsewhere.
