Relevant article written by Shri K.G.Mashruwala

Kishorlal Mashruwala (1890-1952) was born in Mumbai and did his early education from Akola and Mumbai. In 1909, he graduated from Wilson College, Mumbai. He was a close associate of Gandhiji. In 1930 he participated in Salt Satyagraha and Quit India Movement in 1942. He felt that constructive work is a necessary counterpart of non cooperation movement.

As an editor of Harijan in 1950, he wrote a relevant article in Harijan, dated February 12 1950, under the title ‘You Have Let Down Gandhiji’. Here is an extract from the article written by Shri Mashruwala.

“The charge of having let down Gandhiji has become a fashionable utterance because so many of us have cultivated the opposite habit of making Gandhiji and sarvodaya and truth and non-violence hackneyed phrases. Every leader and every minister seems to regard himself as on insecure ground unless he says, “This is what the Father of Nation taught us,” or, “ultimately the good of the world consists in taking to Gandhiji’s way of life.”

It will be far better if, instead of constantly referring to the Father of the Nation, we humbly rely upon Truth and Love within us. For whatever Gandhiji said or did came to him from his quest of Truth and sprang from non-violence. And though the Mahatma is no longer with us, the light which guided him is always there to guide us, if we have the will to accept it.”

-K.G. Mashruwala