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Life of M K Gandhi

Mahatma Gandhi born as Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi in Oct 02,

1869(R1) to Kaba Gandhi and Putli Bai at Porbandar in Kathiawad region

of today’s Gajurat state, got the reverence of Mahatma by none other than

the bard of the nation Gurudev Ravindra Nath Tagore (R2).

After completion of his matriculation in 1887 (R3), he sailed for London

on Sept 1888 (R4) to study Law. In June 1891 he was called to the Bar and

in the next two days he sailed for India (R5). He first started his practice at

Bombay (now Mumbai) and then shifted to Rajkot (R6).

As he was settling his practice at Rajkot, he was offered to work in

South Africa by the Memon Firm from Porbandar. The work involves a

lawsuit concerning a claim of £40,000. Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi

accepted the offer and sailed for South Africa in April 1893. (R7)

M.K Gandhi spent 21 years in South Africa. At South Africa, then a

colony of Great Britain, some of his encounters with the local government

and government officials there made him what he would become and

stood for, upon his return to India.

The first incident that made a lasting impression on him was the way he

was thrown out of a railway compartment by the railway officials for him

being a coloured person (R8). This incident happened as he was moving

from Durban to Pritoria to take up his case in year 1893. This incident

made him understand the position of Indians (termed as coloured) in the

British South Africa. This incident with him, and several other incidents

involving local government decision on Indian people and their business

interest, their living condition etc., made the truth loving lawyer who had

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gone to fight a case of an Indian merchant there, resolve to take up issues

relating to Indian living in South Africa.

It is in South Africa that, the now famous ‘Satyagraha’ took birth

(R9). It was started as a move to oppose the South African government’s

draft Asiatic Law Ordinance published in the Transvaal Government Gazette

Extraordinary of 22 August 1906 (R10). As per it every Indian entitled to

reside in Transvaal had to register his name with the Registrar of Asiatic

and take out a certificate of registration.

‘Satyagraha was born in South Africa in 1908. There was no word in any Indian

language denoting the power which our countrymen in South Africa evoked for the

redress of their grievances. There was an English equivalent namely ‘Passive

Resistance,’ and we carried on with this. However the need for a word to describe this

unique power came to increasingly felt, and it was decided to award a prize to anyone

who could think of an appropriate term. A Guajrati-speaking gentleman submitted the

word ‘Satyagraha’ and it was accepted.

Satyagraha is pure soul-force. Truth is the very substance of the soul. That is why this

force is called Satyagraha. The soul is informed with knowledge. In it burns the flame of

love. If someone gives us pain through ignorance, we shall win him through love. Non-

violence is the supreme dharma. It is thee proof of love. (R11)’

Leading the movement against the draft Asiatic Law Ordinance, M K

Gandhi introduced this new innovation of opposition through Satyagraha.

The plan was simple. Every Indian, residing in South Africa, shall have to

disobey the law voluntarily and go to jail. The Satyagraha movement

triumphed after a long eight years of struggle as the government had to

repeal the act, termed by M K Gandhi as the black act, in early 1914(R12).



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After 21 years in South Africa, in July 1914, M K Gandhi sailed for

India(R13).

Besides initiating Satyagraha, M. K.Gandhi was also publishing a

newspaper named Indian Opinion from year 1904(R14), and instrumental in

setting up of the Phoenix settlement and converting Tolstoy firm into an

epicentre of Satyagraha activities.

Upon his return to India, when he witnessed similar difficulties faced by

Indians in their native but British ruled India, Gandhi resorted to those

activities that brought success in South Africa in repealing the black act.

Like Phoenix settlement in South Africa, he established the

Satyagraha Ashram at Sabarmati in Ahmedabad. Addressing the inmates

of Sabarmati Ashram, Gandhi ji had said

“In South Africa, my best creation was Phoenix. Without it there would have been no

Satyagraha in that country. Without the Ashram here, Satyagraha will be impossible

in India. ... Do not attribute greatness to me for other works of mine; judge me only by

the Ashram.” (R15)

Replicating the Indian Opinion experience in South Africa, Gandhi

published several newspapers namely Young India, Harijan, Navajivan (R16)

etc., to raise voice as well as spread awareness on socio-political issues.

While Gandhi’s legal acumenship and his strong sense of justice put him

in confrontation with the power that be, at South Africa at that time, what

made him the leader of Indians residing in South Africa, was the empathy

he shared with them as well as the simple but effective communication he

developed with them. A voracious reader and writer, Gandhi ji used to



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write letters, memorials and petitions to people concerned with issues-

that may be social, political or religious.

A personality that developed during his 21 years stay at South

Africa-during which was also in constant touch with Indian political

leaders, particularly with Gopal Krishna Gokhale, his political guide (Rajya

Guru) (R17) - got flourished in his home country. The Satyagraha

movement against the British government made him the tallest leader

amongst the Indian freedom fighters. He travelled the whole country,

united people, spread the message of non-violence and initiated

Satyagraha movements against all the policies of British government that

were against the people of this country.

Though Gandhi used to meet people and addresses gatherings to spread

the Satyagraha movement, he was also writing letters in large numbers to

political activists, friends, family members etc., on issues relating to family

affairs, health, social issues, political issues, religious issues etc.. In fact,

Gandhi was particular in writing reply letters to all those people who have

written letters to him.

He was writing letters when on train touring different place for furthering

Satyagraha movement, when on tour collecting fund for the movement;

destitute; people affected by natural calamities etc., on ship, etc..

A reflection of his letter writing spirit, or for that matter his writing spirit

could be gauged from the compilation of his works “Collected Works of

Mahatma Gandhi (CWMG)’ by Publication Division, Ministry of

Information and Broadcasting (min. Of I& B), Government of India.

There are 98 volumes of CWMG which compiled a significant portion of



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his works including ‘Hind Swaraj’ and his autobiography ‘My Experiment

with Truth.’

Leaving petitions, memorials, diaries and health tips, there are about

29,000 letters compiled in the CWMG. The 28956 letters compiled in the

CWMG were written by Gandhi ji to different people during his life span

starting from his letter to his brother Lakshmidas Gandhi from London

on Nov 09, 1888 till the last letter to Sarita (with no dates).

There were some people whom he wrote letters in regular interval. Those

includes Chhaganlal Gandhi and Maganlal Gandhi; sons of his causion

Khushalchand Gandhi, Gopal Krishna Gokhale; his political guru,

Dadabhai Naoroji, Henry S.L.Polak; a close associate in Satyagraha

movement, Millie Graham Polak; Henry Polak’s wife, Hermann

Kallenbach; a prosperous German architect of Johannesburg who gave his

Tolstoy Firm for use by the Satyagrahis in South Africa, Kasturaba

Gandhi; Gandhi ji’s wife, C Rajgopalchari, Jawaharlal Nehru, G D Birla,

Mirabehn, Rajkumari Amrit Kaur, Amtussalaam, Mahadev Desai; his

personal secretary etc..



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References:

R1: My Experiment with Truth, Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi, Vol44, P -95, Publication Division, Ministry of I & B, New Delhi

R2: www.mkgandhi.org/articles/tagoreG.htm &

https://in.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20070709075754AA0e6Jt

R3: Desai, M., & Zackariah, L. (2012). My Early Life: An Illustrated Story(Eds). P-33 Oxford University Press, New Delhi.

R4: ibid p-37

R5: ibid p-54

R6: ibid p-55

R7: ibid p-56


R9: ibid p 246

R10: Desai, M., & Zackariah, L. (2012). My Early Life: An Illustrated Story(Eds). P-104 Oxford University Press, New Delhi.

R11: ibid, P-104

R12: Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi, Vol -14, P-172, PublicationDivision, Ministry of I & B, New Delhi

R13: ibid p-153


R15: Desai, M., & Zackariah, L. (2012). My Early Life: An Illustrated Story(Eds). P-92, Oxford University Press, New Delhi


http://www.mkgandhi.org/articles/tagoreG.htm&


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R17: Desai, M., & Zackariah, L. (2012). My Early Life: An Illustrated Story(Eds). P-154, Oxford University Press, New Delhi AND My experiment withTruth, Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi, Vol 44, P -225, PublicationDivision, Ministry of I & B, New Delhi



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Part- I

Amongst the 100 letters selected in phase-I, Thirty two (32) letters were

written to government officials, 38 letters to co-workers and friends, 17

letters to family members, 06 letters to mentors and leaders and 06 letters

to newspapers and one general letter addressed to European people in

South Africa.

The first phase of the letters was those written by M.K.Gandhi during his

stay in South Africa. He had gone to South Africa as a young Barrister to

work for an Indian merchant settled there, for a year. But, as fate would

have it, he stayed there for several years to come, united the Indians

settled there and fought for their rights.

Within a short span of his arrival, he had to face the humiliation at

a railway compartment for being a ‘coloured’ man and was virtually pulled

out of the train by the railway officials. Though this incident put a lasting

impression on his psyche, he went on to carry the work he was assigned

to. During his stay in that country, he closely witnessed the condition of

Indian indentured labourers, the treatment mated out to them by their

masters and the distinction prevailed in the name of Whites and

‘Coloured’ people. Though he occasionally discussed those issues with

Indians there, but concentrated on his work. However as he was preparing

to return to India after completion of the work, a news item in the ‘Natal

Mercury’ with the headline ‘Indian Franchise’ attracted his attention. The

news was about the Natal government’s move to disfranchise the Indians.

M. K. Gandhi cancelled his return trip to India. He had resolved to fight

for the cause of Indians. As a qualified lawyer, as he started taking up



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issues relating to Indians, people started recognised his leadership. With

the letters being the safest, cheapest and convenient medium of

communication at that time, he wrote hundreds of letters to government

officials, Indians settled in that country, to his mentors, to newspaper

editors and to his family members. While most of the letters written to

government officials dealt with the Indian issues at South Africa, he wrote

letters to newspaper editors to ensure that the issues be discussed at the

newspapers for mass understanding and debate. He used to write letters to

some of leading personalities whom he revered (Dadabhai Naoroji, Gopal

Krihna Gokhale), to explain his position as well as to take guidance, where

as his letters to Indian people and other friends mostly dealt with the

problems faced by them, how to unite them and how to fight with the

dispensation to extract justice. On the other hand, most of his letters sent

to the family members who had gone to South Africa to help him in

carrying out the movement. Most of the letters under this category were

sent to Chhaganlal Gandhi & Maganlal Gandhi –sons of his cousin and in-

charge of Indian Opinion at Phoenix and to Harilal Gandhi, his elder son.

As the objective of this research was to analyse the interpersonal contents

in his letters as well as to see the use of literary tools which might have

played a significant part in communicating his thought so beautifully and

effectively.

Having had to face the wrath of the European officer for being a

‘coloured’ in a train, and witnessing the division of people in the line of

colour, M. K. Gandhi wrote an open letter on this subject matter to the

Europeans in Natal in December 19, 1894(R1). The letter with the date

and place at the top of the right side, started with a ‘SIR.’ Then, in a



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humble manner he wrote ‘ I venture to send you the enclosed for perusal and solicit

your opinion ...” on the subject matter. Even though the open letter was

addressed to the Europeans, M K Gandhi with the objective to reach to

the influential intellectual class of that society and invigorate their

consciousness, deliberately addressed the Editors, Merchants, Clergymen,

Journalists, and Lawyers with making special reference to their respective

field of activities and sought to know from them whether their sense of

duty allows them to treat Indian as the way they are being treated. Making

clear that the Indians are being treated badly by the Europeans in the

Colony due to their Ignorance about Indians, he also urged those

(Europeans) to study the Indians. At the end, he solicited their opinion on

the subject matter wrote that many Europeans in the colony do

sympathise with the Indians and feel for them in the colony.

M K Gandhi ended the letter with writing ‘I am, Sir,’ AND ‘your faithful

servant” in the next line and his name at the last.

In this letter, the sender in a humble manner set the stage for what he was

going to write, in the first two lines. And then he went on to discuss the

matter with conviction and addressed those whose views mattered in

decision making process in the society. To ensure that whatever has been

said needs to be followed up in acts, he suggested that the recipients

should observe the Indians before forming any opinion about them. But

at the same time, he also wrote that several other European fellows in the

colony do sympathise with the Indians and feel for them. Given the fact

that South Africa was a colony of Britain, Gandhi, with the objective to

not to offend them by any manner, signed out the letter by addressing

himself as the ‘faithful servant’.



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From an analytical stand point, it could well be said that, the letter, while

addressing all the elements of courtesy that was desired in a

communication that the above one, also took care not to attract any

adverse reaction from the recipients. And above all, it has discussed all the

issues that need to be communicated with the recipient.

A letter addressed to the Colonial Secretary on Aug 14, 1900 (R2),

in reply to the telegram by the latter on Aug 10, 1900, discusses the

modalities of congratulatory address of the Sultan of Turkey during his

visit to London.

Addressing the Colonial Secretary as ‘The honourable the colonial

secretary’ in capital, M. K. Gandhi went on to write that ‘I have the

honour to inform you…’. He referred the Sultan as ‘His Majesty the

Sultan’ and the Governor as ‘His Excellency the Governor.’ After

discussing the modalities as to how the Congratulatory address for the

silver jubilee celebration be sent, M.K. Gandhi made a humble submission

by writing that “I shall be glad if I receive His Excellency’s opinion for

future reference in such matters, at the end of the letter. He signed out his

letter by writing I have the honour to be, sir, in the next line, your obedient servant

in the third line and his name at the fourth.

In the letter discussed above, M K Gandhi, took care of the basic etiquette

in addressing the persons and office bearers, expressed his humbleness

when he wrote ‘I have the honour to inform you’ or signed out the letter.

He also discussed the whole matter with clarity so that the communication

is complete.



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Another letter regarding permit for the Indians in South Africa, was sent

to one Mr. H. T. Ommanney in the Permit office at Johannesburg on May

21, 2901(R3).

M K Gandhi put an ESQ. after the name of H. T. Ommanney. According

to Oxford Dictionary ESQ is the short form of Esquire, which is a polite title

appended to a man’s name when no other title is used, typically in the address of a letter

or other documents. Then he went on to acknowledge the telegram of the

latter and thanked him on behalf of the Indian Refuge Committee by

writing ‘I have the honour to acknowledge your telegram…and have been

instructed by the Indian Refuge Committee to tender its thanks for same’.

In a humble submission, M.K.Gandhi then went on to list out four names,

which, he explicitly, mentioned in the letter, were drawn out of a lot as

more names were suggested by the Indian Refugees. Writing on behalf of

the Indian refuges’, he then wrote that, he had been requested to draw his

(Ommanney) attention to the fact that most of the Indian refugees are in

Durban and four permits for Natal were too few. In the last line, he

maintained that he had already wired for two names from Cape Town.

He signed out his letter by writing I have the honour to be, sir, in the next line,

your obedient servant in the third line. In this letter he did not put his name at

the end.

In this letter while extending due honour to the government official, in a

humble manner he went to thanked the official for his telegram and then

explained the whole process through which the representative names have

been chosen for the permit.



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Given the fact that, both the aforesaid letters were official letters, M. K.

Gandhi has not used any literary tools. However, he discussed the subject

matters with clarity and made references where ever necessary to draw his

point.

In a letter to Sir George Birdwood, sent from Hotel Cecil in London, on

Oct 25, 1906 (R4)- where M.K.Gandhi stayed during his visit to London

as a delegate of the Transvaal British [Indian] Deputation- discusses

various issues relating to the Deputation. The deputation had gone to

London to discuss the issues arising out of the Asiatic Law Amendment

Ordinance of the Transvaal, with the British government officials.

Gandhi addressed Birdwood as ‘Dear Sir’ and then wrote that he was

‘obliged’ for telegram sent by the recipient, an Anglo-Indian official. He

then went on to discuss the matter relating to the deputation and

comforted the recipient that his (Birdwood) becoming the spokesperson

of the deputation shall not be opposed by a member of the deputation

committee. Gandhi also informed that, he had spoken to Sir Lepel Griffin,

who had, though expressed full sympathy with the views of the

deputation, has declined to lead it.

Having shared the information, Gandhi went on to request for an

appointment with Birdwood, so that he could explain the position of the

deputation members, before they began their work.

Not sure that whether Birdwood has fixed an appointment and

informed this in the letter, which, Gandhi anticipated, must be following

the telegram by Sir Birdwood, thanked the recipient to give an

appointment, if it had not been given in the letter.



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Unlike other letters to British officials where he addressed them as ‘Sir’

this is a letter where the sender addressed the recipient as ‘Dear Sir.’

Similarly at the end the sender signed off the letter by writing ‘your faithfully’

instead of your obediently or your servant as was the case in other several

letters. This signified his closeness and personal rapport with the recipient.

This could be the reason that he foreseen that a letter must have been

following to the telegram by Birdwood.

Despite his ‘supposed’ closeness with the recipient, Gandhi while seeking

an appointment with him wrote in a humble manner “Mr. Ally and I are

anxious to pay our respects to you and to place the position before you.” On the basis

of the analysis, it could well be said that the interpersonal nature of this

communication is fully justified, even though the letter is of official nature.

Moving to another letter, which M K Gandhi, as a delegate of the

Transvaal British [Indian] Deputation, wrote to Winston Churchill, the

then Under Secretary of States for the Colonies on Nov 15, 1906 from

Hotel Cecil in London(R5).

In this short letter, Gandhi sought an appointment with Churchill to

appraise him about the position of the British Indians living in Transvaal.

Winston Churchill’s name was followed by an ESQ. In the next line his

position was read thus ‘His Majesty’s Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies.’

As placing an ESQ after the name of a person in an correspondence was a

customary practice of the Westerners of that era, Gandhi sincerely

followed it, he was, however, very particular in writing the position of the

recipient. He could have written the position as ‘Under-Secretary of State

for the Colonies.’ But, writing, what he had written, it appears that

Gandhi, wanted to express his humbleness towards the British king as well

as towards his Under-Secretary. Then he addressed the recipient as ‘Sir’



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and went on to inform him that he (Gandhi) along with Mr. Ally have

come as a deputation from Transvaal on behalf of British Indians and

requested Churchill an appointment to appraise him about their position.

Well aware of the fact that he might not be given a hearing, he requested

for a short time with the assurance that they would be waiting for him

(Churchill).

Then he ended the letter by writing ‘I have the honour to remain,’ with ‘sir’ in

the next line that followed by ‘yours obediently.’

Knowing too well as he was dealing with a person who could play a crucial

role on the issue the deputation had taken to London, Gandhi took

utmost care in showing his humbleness as well as putting the recipient in

high esteem. This is the reason he signed off the letter by writing ‘yours

obediently.’

If we look at another letter that was- though intended for Earl of

Elgin, Principal Secretary of State for the Colonies- addressed to his

private secretary (R6) dated Nov 24, 1906 and again sent from the Hotel

Cecil in London, M K Gandhi, the sender, signed off with ‘your obedient

servant.’

Given the fact that Earl of Elgin was the Principal Secretary of

State for the Colonies, where as Winston Churchill was the deputy

secretary, there is a stark difference in the signing off the letter. While

Gandhi simply put ‘yours obediently’ in his letter to Churchill, he put ‘your

obedient servant’ at the end of the letter to the Earl of Elgin. This implies

how the tone and tenor of communication got changed with the change of

position.

There has been a complete difference in approach by M.K.Gandhi in the

letter to Under Secretary for Colonies, sent in year 1909 (R7) as compared



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to the letter sent in year 1906. Sent from London on Nov 12, 1909, the

sender did not go by the regular humble practice in putting the name and

designation of the receiver before discussing the subject matter. Instead,

he went straight with a ‘Sir’ and acknowledged the receipt of a letter from

the under secretary.

He then, citing the reasons with conviction, wrote that the deportation of

one Mr. Chunilal Panachand to India by the authorities was not justified.

To make the Under Secretary aware of the situation in wrong

interpretation of the law, Gandhi then cited an example where he

appeared in the court as a lawyer on behalf of one Indian Mr. Shelat and

informed that had he not appeared in that case and rectified the matter,

Mr. Shelat might had been deported to India. He also feared that similar

incidents might swell if the law is not interpretated in right manner.

He also signed off the letter with a customary ‘I have, etc.,’ followed by his

name in the next line.

The tone of the letter was evident from the beginning. Moving through

the contents, it is clear that the sender had done a plain talk on issues that

concerned him. To buttress his points, he also cited an example where he

himself had appeared. Here, both of the communicants had been on

constant touch for several years and knew each others’ area of reference

too well. Hence the sender might have taken the liberty in talking plain to

the receiver.

The difference in approach could also be due to the time period the

sender had been pursuing the affairs of Indians living in South Africa,

with the British government authorities. In 1906, the Asiatic Law

Amendment Ordinance of the Transvaal was published in the Gazettee

and Gandhi might have thought that a proper representation before the



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higher authorities could be suffice in repealing it. However by 1909, he

had already leading the Indians in their movement against the Asiatic

Ordinance of the Transvaal. With Gandhi and his team proposing a fair

deal to the Indians and the British government disposing their proposal, it

was obvious that there might have been stiffness in approach by both the

sides. This stiffness is evident in the aforesaid letter.

As the subject matter of this study was ‘interpersonal

communication,’ it is well be said that, letters gives ample evidence of the

relationships between the communicants through simple nuances, even if

there is no remark, explicitly or implicitly, to this effect is made in the

content.

Now we can look at a letter sent to Lord Ampthill in September 1909

from London (R8).

This is the letter sent by M K Gandhi when he along with three other

persons was on a second deputation to London to discuss the Transvaal

Indian question with the British government officials. At that time Lord

Ampthill, a former acting Viceroy of India was living at London and was

taking up causes of Indians in South Africa. Lord Ampthill was in the loop

as the negotiation on the matter of Transvaal Indian was under progress.

Gandhi wrote this letter detailing his meeting with Lord Crewe, Secretary

of State for Colonies.

As Gandhi was constantly in touch with Lord Ampthill over letters and

telegram, he got rid of the formalities in naming and addressing the

Viceroy before the subject matter. Instead, he addressed the recipient as

‘My Lord.’ By doing this he, it appeared, had achieved two things in a

single shot. One, he showed his respect by not addressing him by ‘Sir’ but

by his honorary designation ‘Lord’ and secondly, the ‘My’ before the



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‘Lord’ signalled the closeness of both the conversing persons and there by

bringing the ‘warmth’ in their relationship.

Then he went on detailing the meeting, he and Hajee Habib (an

Indian businessmen migrated to South Africa and settled there) had with

Lord Crewe. Gandhi informed that the Secretary of State for Colonies had

a sympathetic view towards the issue. Gandhi also informed that Lord

Crewe had promised to press upon the British officials at the affairs in

Transvall to accept the amendments, as suggested by Gandhi through

Lord Ampthill, in the said act. Gandhi them went on to write that, the

Secretary of State for Colonies had acknowledged that the matter was

‘Imperial Question’ and should be treated as such.

In the letter, Gandhi, while enlarging the scope of the issue to that of

British Empire, also tried to reassure the acting Viceroy in India that, his

intervention and suggestions had also been taken in right spirit by the

authorities at London, the Empire headquarters. Even though, the latter

was of written to a government official, it reflects the interpersonal

relationship of the interacants.

Now we move to the letters written by M K Gandhi to the friends & co-

workers. In a letter to John Robinson, the first Prime Minister of Natal,

from Rajkot on April 27, 1902 (R9), Gandhi addressed him as ‘Dear Sir

John’ and then went on to thank him for the letter and the photograph he

had sent in March that year. In fact, to show his sense of gratitude for the

photograph sent by Mr. John, Gandhi wrote ‘I have to thank... for the

photograph, which I shall prize very much.’ While appreciating that the

recipient had liked a book (Max Muller) suggested by the sender, Gandhi,

also thanked him for his enquiry about his (Gandhi’s) health. He then



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went on to write on the increasing poverty and distress caused by famine

and plague in India and possible solutions that came to his mind.

At the last paragraph, Gandhi hoping that Mr. John was having

good health, wished that God may continue to grant him good health for

many more years so that he could serve South Africa with his vast

knowledge and experience. At the end, he again expressed his respect to

Mr. John and ‘Lady Robinson.’ He signed off the letter by writing ‘I

remain,’ in the first and ‘yours truly’ in the next line.

An analytical look at the letter explains that, the sender had maintained

basic English etiquettes throughout the letter, i.e. while addressing the

receiver with his honorary designation ‘Sir’, addressing Mrs. Robinson as

‘Lady Robinson’ etc.. He then went on to discussing the issue of his

country (India), its problems and the system of governance with the

receiver. This implies that, both had common frame of reference- a

prerequisite for successful interpersonal communication- as far as India is

concerned.

Given the fact that the recipient was a leading political figure of

Natal and was in advance age, Gandhi showed his courtesy by wishing

him good health and long life hoped that his country would be benefited

from his experience.

We shall see now another letter written to Parsee Rustomjee at Bombay by

M K Gandhi from Johannesburg on June 1905 (R10). Parsee Rustomjee

happened to be the first and fast friend of M K Gandhi in South Africa.

This letter was written in Gujrati. From this letter, it appeared that,

Rustomjee, a businessmen from India, who had established a business in

South Africa, had been in India and was building a house. In the

meanwhile, M K Gandhi-the Barrister at Law and his friend- visited his



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business at Durban and then wrote this letter informing the state of affairs

there. In this letter, Gandhi wrote the full name and address of the

recipient at the beginning and then address the recipient as ‘Dear Sheth ’

followed by a ‘Shri’ and then his full name (Shri Rustomjee Jivanji

Ghorkhodu). He then went on to discuss the subject matter and informed

him that the business is not doing well. But Gandhi asked Rustomjee not

to return to South Africa in a hurry without completing the construction

of the house in India. He also advised the recipient to write letter to his

business at Durban at regular interval. At the penultimate line, he while

enquiring the health of Rustomjee, asked him to write about him. And

then went on to extend his respect to Rustomjee’s mother and asked the

recipient to ask his sons to write to him (Gandhi). He ended his letter by

tendering ‘Salaams.’

From the contents of the letter, one can see the respect and affinity shared

by the interacants. The fellow-feelingness and empathy was also evident

when the sender while informing the latter that his business was not doing

well, asked him not to be in a hurry to return and complete the job he was

undertaking elsewhere. By writing his he had in fact, tried to assure the

recipient that his business interests are being taken care of. The close

personal relationship between the two was also evident from the fact that,

the sender tendered respect to the recipient’s mother and asking the

recipient to ask his sons to write to him (sender). Unless there is a

relationship that extended to knowing each other’s family, possibility of

one asking for letters from the other’s family members is remote. Besides,

by enquiring about the receiver’s health and tendering respect to his

mother, Gandhi in one hand, showed his concern & affection, and on the

other completed the formalities a letter would required.



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Given the fact that the recipient was a Parsee by faith, Gandhi also took

care in extending ‘Salaams’ while signing off the letter. The nuances,

etiquettes and words of concerns, it could well be said, are the features

that enhanced the interpersonal communication of the letter. Moving to

another letter sent by Gandhi to Dada Osman at Durban on July 1905

(R11). Dada Osman- an Indian origin South African businessman who

had settled there- happened to be one of the close friend and co-worker of

Gandhi in South Africa. The zest of the letter was that, Gandhi, who was

leading a movement against the government’s policies on over the

Transvaal Indian case as well as Indian Licences issue, was advising the

recipient, who also happened to be a businessman also as to how to deal

with the situation. The letter was written after receiving a letter from Dada

Osman.

In this letter, written in Gujrati, Gandhi, addressed the recipient by full

name and then acknowledged the receipt of his letter. He then went on

explaining the possible actions that could be taken against his business

under the Indian Licence rules and advised the recipient to be cautious. As

the ‘Indian Licence’ issue was of great importance for the Indian Origin

people in South Africa, Gandhi also advised the recipient to take possible

care on the appeal made against the Indian Licence policy. In the

meanwhile, he also advised the recipient to see the town clerk and other

officials so as to keep his business interests protected.

An analytical perspective was that, the letter was written by someone who

is closely looking at the ground scenario at the place concerned and had

advised the recipient on several issues. This also gives ample evidence

about the common frame of reference by both the interacants. This could

be the reason that the sender at Johannesburg referred about a case that is



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being dealt at Durban, the place of residence of the recipient. And above

all, the sender made it a point to write the letter in ‘Gujrati’ so that the

sense of intimacy coming out of one’s mother tongue remained intact.

As per the message centred perspective, interpersonal

communication is a complex social process, in which participants establish

a communicative relationship, exchange message in an effort to generate

shared meaning and to achieve social goals.

The letter justifies all the characteristics discussed above i.e. ‘communicative

relationship’ as both the interacants were communicating; ‘exchange

message in an effort to generate shared meaning’ as the both the interacants

discussed issues that has got common frame of reference; and ‘to achieve

social goals’ as in this particular case, the interacants were discussing an

issue and its possible outcome, that is related to the Indians in South Africa

and hence social aspect has also been taken care of.

Now we shall move to a letter Gandhi wrote to A. H. West in November

1906(R12). The letter was written from Hotel Cecil in London- when

Gandhi was a part of a deputation to London to discuss the Transvaal

Indian question with the British government officials- to A H West (fn1), at

Phoenix in Natal.

Gandhi addressed the recipient as ‘Dear Mr. West’ and wrote that he was

writing a short letter and ‘feared’ that he would be writing short letters

during his short stay in England. He then discussed his itinerary and then

informed that he was writing the copy of the letter that was sent to another

co-worker. Then he hoped that Mrs. West was comfortable and going on

nicely with the hope that Mrs. Gandhi had received her well.Fn1: West was an English Origin South African who become a friend and ardent follower of Gandhi andwas looking after the publication of ‘Indian Opinion’ at the time the letter was written.(http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/1ca11fd0-1fc6-11e3-aa36-0144feab7de.html)


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Given the fact that Mr. West was a friend of Gandhi, it could not have been

anything but ‘Dear’ at the initial address. From the contents of the letter it

appears that, Gandhi used to communicate through ‘long letters’ to Mr.

West and the latter cherished those letters. This could be reason that,

Gandhi wrote, “I fear I shall have to do so during the short time I remain

here.” This implies that, both the communicants had a good personal

rapport and understanding. Besides, Gandhi by enquiring about the wellness

about Mrs. West with the hope that she was being treated well by Mr.

Gandhi, reinforced the personal touch with family orientation in the letter.

Besides, Gandhi also mentioned that he was sending a copy of the letter

that was sent to Mr. Polak(fn2) and at the end of the letter marked

‘enclosure.’ This implies that the copy of the letter was attached with the

letter. By doing this, he ensure that all the friends are in loop over what is

being transpired between them. This again, could be seen in the light of his

objective to have common frame of reference between the interacants so

that future communications could be easy. At the end, Gandhi wrote the

address with a customary honorary Esquire (Esq.) after the name of Mr.

West. The writing of Esq. After one’s name might be a custom and English

tradition at that time, but Gandhi wrote this deliberately to give the due

‘honour’ to a person he was friendly with. According to Brant R Burleson

(R13), interpersonal communication between parties separated by time andFn2: H S L Polok, a Jew from Britain, befriended with Gandhi at South Africa and latterengaged in the publication of Indian Opinion at Phoenix. He continued to be a close friendand associate of Gandhi. A friend of both Gandhi and West.1.http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/1ca11fd0-1fc6-11e3-aa36-0144feab7de.html#axzz2z2jgIXt2)


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space is possible because the participants are intimately familiar with the

nature of the communication in shared time and space and thus can make

necessary accommodations to adjust for temporal or-spatial separation.

If we analyse the above letter, it could be well said that both the interacants,

though were at different place, were familiar with the nature of the

communication and have common frame of reference and hence could

make necessary adjustment as per the need. Now we move to a letter

written by M K Gandhi to a friend from a prison in South Africa on

October 08, 1908 (R14). In the letter to J. J. Doke (fn3), Gandhi mentioned

the place of writing of the letter as ‘King Edward’s Hotel’ at Volksrust. As

per the available documents, it is evident that Gandhi had named Volksrust

prison as ‘King Edward’s Hotel.’ This is the prison where Gandhi was

interned on Oct 07 that year as the movement against the Transvaal Indian

act was picking up across the country.

Starting the letter with Dear Mr. Doke, Gandhi acknowledged of

receiving a letter from him when he was at Phoenix and then went on to

discuss the issues he wanted to convey. He then asked his recipient to write

if there was any question on the decisions taken by him (Gandhi). Before

closing, he also excused himself for not writing to the recipient’s daughter

and then wrapped up the letter by wiring ‘yours sincerely’ with his name in

the last line. Gandhi had given Volksrust prison as ‘King Edward’s Hotel

and the mention of ‘King Edward’s Hotel’ as place of writing the letter,

implies that the recipient too was aware of this fact and hence both the

communicants might had a common area of reference. Besides, by

acknowledging that the letter he was writing in reply to the letter he had-Fn3: Joseph J. Doke was a Baptist and preacher of South Africa. He wrote the first biography on Gandhititled ‘An Indian Patriot in South Africa’. 1.http://dacb.org/stories/southafrica/doke_jj.html2.http://www.gandhitopia.org/profiles/blogs/doke-and-mahatma-gandhi


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received from Doke, it was again confirmed that there had been regular

communication between them.

After discussing the core issue, Gandhi also excused himself for not

writing the recipient’s daughter (Olive) who had wished him on his birthday

on Oct 02, by writing a letter on Sept. 30.

This again implies that, there had been personal and family

relationship between the communicants. From the natural flow of the

words and the matter of fact attitude in the construction of the sentences, it

appears that, as if there has been one-to-one talk between two persons.

Taking all these in view, it could well be said that, the letter is a classic

example of interpersonal communication between two friends who had

many things in common and had a common or similar frames of reference.

Now we shall move to a letter written to Henry Soloman Leon Polak (H S

L Polak) from London in July 1909 (R15). At that time Gandhi was in

London as a part of the Indian Deputation to discuss the Transvaal Indian

issue, and Polak, was en-route to India. At the beginning Gandhi addressed

him as ‘My Dear Henry’ and then informed him that he had nothing

startling to report and then went on to discuss the happenings at London

relating to the Transvaal Indian issue. After naming several people, Gandhi

wrote that he would not bother Polak with other names. He also forwarded

a letter received by him from a British Official to ensure that Polak could

make an inference out of the details discussed above. After dedicating two

paragraphs for the purpose, Gandhi moved to Polak’s personal aspects and

expressed his (Gandhi) disappointment for not being able to know the

steamer by which Polak was travelling to India. He also hoped that the

recipient would telegram his arrival to him. In the meanwhile he informed

Polak that he was cabling to a person who could make suitable



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arrangements for Polak in India. He then went on to discuss on how his

(Polak’s) family are putting up in London and assured him that the

arrangement was good. He asked Polak to meet some people in India

during his visit. In the next paragraph, he then shifted to describe the affairs

at London i.e. to be precise, the banquet for the Ottoman Parliament

delegates which he attended. At the end, Gandhi wrote about the non

publication of some materials sent to Polak and informed him that he was

sending him a copy of the letter he (Gandhi) had written to Prof. Gokhale.

Upon analysing the numerous letters written by Gandhi to his friends and

co-workers, it came to light that it was Polak whom Gandhi used to address

with ‘My Dear’ and his initial name ‘Henry’ i.e. ‘My Dear Henry,’ where as

to others he used to write ‘Dear (name).’ This gave enough indication as to

how Gandhi valued and treated Polak. Then analysing the quite lengthy

letter, it appeared that both the interacants knew most of the characters

engaged in the Transvaal Indian issue. Besides, the length at which the

sender describes the events at London gives ample evidence of their

common keenness on the issue. By enquiring itinerary of the recipient and

informing that he (Gandhi) was cabling to one Daphtari to make necessary

arrangement in India, Gandhi showed his concern and affection towards the

latter. On the other hand, he by writing the wellness of Millie (fn4) and her

children tried to assured the recipient that he (Gandhi) was in constant

touch with them at London. This proves that both the interacants knew

each other’s family quite well. At one point Gandhi asked Polak to meet the

son of Mr. Nazar (fn5) during his visit to India.Fn4: Millie Graham Polak, wife of Henry Soloman Leon Polak1.https://sites.google.com/site/whoisthisjesus/gandhiandchristianity2.http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/1ca11fd0-1fc6-11e3-aa36-00144feab7de.html#axzz2z2jgIXt2Fn5: Mansukhlal Hiralal Nazar. He was the first editor of Indian Opinion and was a goodfriend of Gandhi who died in 1906.( Gandhi, M., K. (1927), My Experiment with Truth, P-302,Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi, Publication Division, Min. of I & B, New Delhi.


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By asking Polak to meet Nazar’s son in India during his visit, Gandhi tried

to achieve several objectives (i) To reassure his concern and affection for

Nazar’s son (ii) and by sending Polak, who was actively engaged in the

publication of Indian Opinion, Gandhi wanted to to show him (Nazar’s son)

that Indian Opinion is still remembering him (Nazar).

On the basis of the length of the letter, the subject matters discussed,

peoples named and referred, and the natural flow at which the writing

proceeded, it could well be inferred that, both the interactants had a good

personal rapport and hence the letter is a well written document of

interpersonal communication. Now we move to a letter Gandhi wrote to

Millie Graham Polak in December 1909 (R16). From the context in the

letter it was clear that Gandhi wrote this letter in reply to the letter written

by Millie.

In the letter Gandhi addressed her as ‘My Dear Millie’ and then

informed her that he was writing the letter from Mr. Kallenbach’s (fn6) tent.

Gandhi also described her about the activities of his son (Manilal). Then he

pointed out that the recipient in her letter addressed him as ‘Brother’ and

questioned her whether she could give him the confidence of a sister?

Taking inference out of it by himelf, he went on to write that, if she has the

answer in affirmative, then he certainly ‘shall try to be brother to her.’

Gandhi then wrote about the fund he was transferring to her and then

discuss the work her husband (H S L Polak) was doing in India. As a

gesture of humbleness, he informed Millie that Henry was doing much

better work independently than with him (Gandhi). Having accepting her asFn6: Hermann Kallenbach was a German born Jewish South African architect who

was one of the foremost friends and associates of M K Gandhi. He had donated to Gandhi athousand acre (4 km²) farm belonging to him near Johannesburg. The farm was used to runGandhi's famous "Tolstoy Farm" that housed the families of satyagrahis.1.http://www.sahistory.org.za/people/hermann-kallenbach2.http://www.mkgandhi.org/associates/kallenbach.htm


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the ‘Sister’, Gandhi assured her to do a brother’s duty in providing

emotional support to her during his stay in London as her husband was

away in India. He then discussed about the personal traits of Millie and

Maud (fn7) but refrained from discussing about Henry. He also enquired

about Millie’s children and at the end paragraph. Gandhi informed Millie

about what he thought about a reform proposal put forth by a British

government official in India. The sender however did not mention

anything about himself with the signing off line that ‘Of myself you will

learn from elsewhere’ and ended by writing “With Love” followed by

‘Your Brother.’

This is another letter where Gandhi addressed the recipient with the

affectionate “My Dear” and ended the letter with ‘with love.’ From the

content it was evident that he accepted her as his sister and this was

reflected in the last line of his letter where he signed off by writing ‘yours

sincerely, your brother.’

In the letter Gandhi mentioned about his friend, his son, her niece, her

literary skills, her husband, and her children. He also comforted her by

assuring that he would be with her during his visit to London to make up

the solitary life she was living as her husband was away in India.

From this it could well be inferred that, both the communicants

had a close personal relationship, had sympathy and empathy for each

other, and were in constantly writing to each other. As a result, they

shared a common understanding of the people, place and incidents

mentioned by the sender. Besides, the sender’s way of writing the letter,

his gesture in appreciating the literary

Fn7: Maud Polak, Sister of H S L Polak.1.http://www.webpages.uidaho.edu/ngier/gantan5000.htm



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skills of the recipient as well as her personal traits, and his appreciation of

the work of her husband has added flavour to the letter which was bound

to impress upon the recipient who had a shared understanding as that of

the sender. And hence, the letter fulfils the criteria of interpersonal

communication from the message centred perspective i.e. communicating

relationships, shared meaning of exchanged messages and also achieved

social goals. Here is another letter where Gandhi addressed his recipient

with the prefix ‘My Dear’. This letter was written to Hermann Kallenbach

in 1913(R17) where Gandhi address the recipient as ‘My Dear Lower

House’ and signed off his letter by writing ‘With Love’ followed by ‘Upper

House’(fn8).

Sent from Phoenix, in this letter Gandhi discussed about the daily chorus

in the firm with the explanation that he was writing all those things only to

tell the recipient as to how close he was to the sender and how he (sender)

remembers him in all that work he does. Having had written this, Gandhi

then became philosophical and wrote as to how people looked at things

from different perspective. In response to a quarry from Kallenbach,

Gandhi in this letter informed him that he did not want to do the work

(Satyagraha in South Africa) continuously but was planning for his

withdrawal. Then Gandhi expressed his fear that the recipient was

collecting things for the household, which were earlier removed by him

(sender) and wrote “I shall feel deeply hurt.’ Gandhi signed off his letter

by tendering his affection with ‘My Love’ and then signed as ‘Upper

House’ in place of his name.

Fn8: In Gandhi's words, he and Kallenbach became "soulmates” and Gandhi termedhimself as the ‘upper house’ and Kallenbach as the ‘lower house,’ the Lower Housebeing a metaphore for preparing the budget, and the Upper House vetoing for it.Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hermann_Kallenbach



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Even as the objective of this research was to examine the interpersonal

aspects in the letter, in this letter, the sender had himself admitted that he

and the receiver were very close.

The letter communication was between two people who have adopted two

‘pen names’ to address each other in their letter communications. This is a

rare case where communicants address each other with ‘pen names.’ This

kind of communication is possible only when both of them had a better

understanding on each other and were good friends. This was in fact,

admitted by the sender when he wrote ‘I mention the incident to tell you,

how near you are to me in all that I am doing.’ Gandhi’s assertion that ‘he

shall feel deeply hurt’ over a presumptive action of the recipient could also

be seen in the light of ‘interpersonal relationship’ perspective where the

sender presumed something and expressed his reservation over it with the

hope that the recipient would acknowledge and act. According to Arthur

Bochner (as cited by Trenholm & Jensen (2008)) private relationships are

those where the social bonding gains coherence from ‘sentimental bond’

between people who are generally homogeneous where as public

relationships are those where mutual sentiments are unnecessary.’ The

letter discussed above had explicit sentimental overtones in the beginning,

in the body, at the fag-end of the letter and at the signing off when he

wrote ‘with love.’ Taking this in view along with the assertions, pen names

etc., it could well be said that, the letter communication was between two

people who not only had a common area of reference but also had

understanding at psychological level.Now we shall move to the letters by

M K Gandhi to the press. The letter was written to three local dailies of

Johannesburg in September 1906 (R18). In this letter Gandhi raise the



95

issue of permit for Indians in the British Colony which, in his account,

had set up a reign of terror for British Indian women and children. With

an objective to drew attention of the media organisations and also to

arouse their sense of justice on the issue so as to ensure that the letter gets

published with comments, Gandhi wrote that he was writing the letter

with the ‘trust’ that the press would give publicity to the issue for the sake

of ‘elementary justice.’ He in fact, urged the press to write comment, on

the issue that had brought a shocking state of affairs in the colony.

Gandhi then went on to narrate the hardship faced by an Indian woman

for not holding any permit at hand even though she was travelling with

her husband who had carried a valid permit. As the woman was arrested

and had to pass the night in the lock up and had to stand in the dock like a

common criminal, Gandhi questioned the intention of the Transvaal

government and wondered whether the government was setting up a reign

of terror for British Indian women and children.

To bring home his point, Gandhi then referred the permit regulations

which had mandated that wives and children travelling with their

husbands and parents were not required to take out permits. By doing this

he also made it clear that, his letter was not without any substance and

hence be considered with due seriousness. Gandhi also reminded that he

was not citing a tale from ‘Arabian Nights’ but describing the truth. He

also questioned whether all these are required?

The reference of ‘Arabian Nights’ in the letter is also important. With

hypothetical and bigger than life characters and boundless imaginations,

tales of Arabian Nights have been entertaining generations. Gandhi



96

referring this, it appears, has touched upon the shared understanding or,

we may say, the common area of reference about the tales.

As we analyse this letter, it appeared that, the communicants had common

area of reference on several occasions. The objective was to communicate

some messages with the aim that the recipient acts as intended. Given the

fact that the letter was published, the sender achieved his goal. Hence the

communication was complete.

Now we move to another letter to the press Gandhi wrote in June 02,

1910 (R19). The letter was reproduced by Indian Opinion in its issue

dated June 11, 1910. The letter was written to the press in Johannesburg, a

day after the South African Union came into existence. The crux of the

letter was that, while, the European races in South Africa and native

Africans were celebrating the occasion, the Asiatics could not, for the

reason that they were continuously been deprived of the freedom in

moving and settling in that country without a valid permit. Gandhi also

cited several instances in which cultured and highly educated Indians were

also being detained and ordered to be deported. Referring that native

South Africans, who were struggling for the Union and were behind the

bars had been released, advocated for the same treatment for the Asiatics

in South Africa.

Noteworthy here that Gandhi was leading a movement against the ‘Indian

Licence’ law that mandated British Indians in South Africa to apply for

permits for moving and staying in South Africa. By the time, South

African Union came into existence, the movement against the ‘Indian

Licence’ was continuing and Indian strugglers were being detained and

deported irrespective of their education and status.



97

Under this background, Gandhi wrote this letter to the press. The

objective was to touch upon the sentimental chord of the new

establishment as well as the people in the new union, so that ‘Indian

Licence Act’ could be repealed.

As we analyse the letter, Gandhi started the letter with a positive note by

referring the rejoicing of people under the new South African Union. And

then came the anti-climax, with Gandhi referring that same enthusiasm

was not there with the Asiatics as they were continuously been arrested

and deported. By doing this, Gandhi, while acknowledging the reasons for

celebration, also provided food for thought to the ‘press’ and thereby the

pubic, on the issue of Asiatics. This way the inherent message was

communicated. To buttress his points, he then cited several instances. On

the other hand to bring a parallel comparison on the issue to that of the

issue of native South African, he also cited the release of South African

rebel leader with the birth of South African Union. These are the points,

that strengthened the points Gandhi was making and thus supplemented

and complemented the message.

The letter could be termed as a multifaceted letter. It is soft as well as

hard, at a point he had denounced British act but in the same sentence he

wished that the strengthening of the crown with the formation of the

Union. He had spoken about the legitimate ambitions of South Africans

but in the same coin he compared the position of the native Asiatics. All

these aspects could only be communicated amongst people who had the

common frame of reference and shared the common platform in dealing

with it. On the basis, it could well be said that the letter had



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communicated the message to its intended person and hence completed

the interpersonal communication.

Now we move to the letters written by M K Gandhi to his family

members.

This was a letter written to Chhaganlal Gandhi (fn9) in September 25,

1905 from Johannesburg (R20) in response to his letter. The letter was

written in Gujrati, the mother tongue of both the sender and the receiver.

As the recipient was like a son to the sender, he addressed Chhaganlal as

‘my dear Chhaganlal’ and went straight to discuss the issues Chhaganlal

had raised in his letter. The contents of the letter, it seems, looks like an

advisory where the sender had guided the recipient as to how to deal with

the people he was not comfortable with; how to handle the affairs of the

establishment he was in-charge of; and on how to handle the financial

matters of the establishment. Simultaneously, to instil a sense of

confidence on the recipient, the sender affirmed his faith on him and

wrote “The press is not going to close down so long as you two are

there.” Writing on monetary matters, the sender shared his information

with the receiver and also gave certain instructions as to how money

should be spent as far as the functioning of the press is concerned. On the

other hand, in an instance where a relative was involved in the fund

related matter, M K Gandhi- sensing that Chhaganlal might not be

comfortable in seeking the details of that fund - sought permission from

him, before writing directly to him (another relative of M K Gandhi).

Given the fact that the sender had already reposed faith on the capacity of

Fn9: Chhaganlal Gandhi, son of M K Gandhi’s cousin Khusalchand Gandhi. He was in-charge of the Gujrati Section of Indian Opinion and printing press at Phoenix.Source: 1.http://www.gandhiserve.org/pg.html/



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Chhaganlal in handling the affairs, M K Ganndhi, also did not forget to

instruct the recipient to handle all such matter uniformly. Mohandas then

sign out the letter without any formal courtesy as was the case in other

letters. This could be for the reason that, the letter was to a family

member, who was like a son to him and did not require any courtesy from

the elder.

After signing out, the sender, adding ‘Please See (PS.)’ referred

some instances based on which he also instructed the recipient to act.

This is a letter where minimum courteous words were used. It

appears as if the communicants were conversing on a one-to-one talk. The

words were simple and the sentences had a natural flow. There were

several references to which both the conversant were privy to, and hence,

the sender while referring the names went on to instruct certain action

from the side of the recipient. Besides, the sender sensing that certain

references might not be understood properly by the recipient, added

details about them after signing out his letter. And above all, the letter in

Gujarati had given the linguistic and homely aura to the conversation.

Now we shall move to another letter, this too was written to

Chhaganlal Gandhi in April 21, 1907 from Johannesburg (R21). This letter

in Gujarati was written in response to a letter M K Gandhi had received

from the recipient’s aunt.

In this letter, the sender addressed the recipient as ‘Chi’(for

Chiranjibi). This is a term used by the Indian elders as a blessing or with

affection towards junior members in the family. As the recipient was

blessed with a child, the sender, as a family elder, gave some health tips on



100

how the new born be handled. He then expressed his wish “I would like

your son to be healthy as Mrs. Polak’s.”

The sender then went on to instruct several points related to the

publication of Indian Opinion. At this point, in every sentence, the sender

used ‘please’ in the beginning and then went on to instruct the recipient to

do the work like ‘please ask Thakkar to translate the speech read by ....”.

At last M K Gandhi enquired as to how the recipient was doing and

how was his relation with Mr. West and his opinion about going to

England. He then signed out by giving his ‘blessings.’ But the letter did

not end here. The sender added ‘please see’ i.e. PS, and then added several

point, which, it appeared, he had missed to write earlier. Here he referred

about the materials he had sent to the recipient for publication. He, while

questioning as to why certain materials were sent to him given the fact that

another person was there to do that work, made it clear that he had

nothing to say, if that arrangement was being adhered to.

This letter was written about 18 months after a letter discussed

above. But, the tone and tenor of this letter is more or less same to that of

the previous letter. However as the context was different, the contents in

the letter had a different connotations. In the present letter, the sender

first discussed some family issues, then went on to discuss work related

matters and at the end enquired about personal details. But here also, the

references were common to both, the sentences were like one-to-one talk

between the two and the family senior went on instructing the junior on

each and every matter. But the icing was the use of ‘please’ by the sender

before instructing works related to the publication of Indian Opinion. This

was perhaps used to give a sense of humbleness by sender so that the



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receiver- despite being instructed to do several things-might not feels that

he was being bossed.

Now we move to a letter M K Gandhi had written from Johannesburg in

July 26, 1908 to Kushalchand Gandhi (R22). This letter in Gujarati was

written in reply to the letter sent by Khushalchand(fn10). The sender

addressed the recipient as ‘KhushalBhai’ with a prefix ‘Revered.’ As it is a

common practice in Gujarat to address every male person not younger to

the addresser are suffixed a ‘Bhai’ to their name, here, the sender prefixed

‘revered’ to the name. This implies that, the recipient was elder to the

sender. From the history (R23) we know that that M K Gandhi was

leading a movement against the government in South Africa--over the

‘Transvaal Indian Issue.’ Kushalchand, an elder cousin of him, in a matter

of caution, had advised him to look after himself while leading the

struggle. The caution could also had arisen from the fact that

Khusalchan’s son was with Mohandas in South Africa and was handling

the affairs of ‘Indian Opinion’ which was primarily used to voice the

concerns of British Indians in South Africa. The above letter was written

in reply to that letter.

As Khushalchand had advised Mohandas to look after ‘himself,’ in this

letter, Mohandas (M K Gandhi) replied as to what his way of thinking on

‘self’ and how he wanted to take care of it. This is a classic case where the

sender, though junior to the receiver, had written up his mind on the

philosophical question of ‘self’ in reference to the scriptures of religious

book and also as to how he wanted to live. He wrote on what the ‘Hindu’

religious book “The Bhagwat Gita” had to say on ‘self’ and its teaching on

Fn10: Kushalchand Gandhi, M K Gandhi’s cousin and father of Chhaganlal Gandhi.



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Source: http://www.gandhiserve.org/pg.html/sacrificing one’s body if need arises. Having written that, Mohandas felt

that what Khushalchand had advised was earthly and irreligious and made

it clear that he was against that way of living. Mohandas then signed out

by tendering his ‘respects.’ As Mohandas was writing a short letter, he

reasoned it out in the beginning by writing that he was writing the letter in

the middle of the night and hence he had no time to write a long letter. In

fact, by writing that the letter was being written in the ‘middle of a night,’

Mohandas had also touched upon the issue what he wrote in the

subsequent paragraphs. In the letter, the sender gave due honour to his

elder cousin in his opening address as well as tendering his respect at the

end. However with an objective to address the concerns of a father as well

as an elder cousin, Mohandas took the help of religious teachings so that

the recipient could be convinced. This short letter hovering around the

issue of ‘self’ had every ingredients of an interpersonal communication. It

was written in reply to the recipient, which implied that both

communicants were conversing with each other. The sender did not

explicitly made reference about the religious scripture but only mentioned

about characters and aspects. This implies that both the communicants

had a common frame of reference and hence there was no need for an

explicit reference. As we have already know that the interacants were

related to each other, and the communication had several things in

common reference, it could be well termed as ‘interpersonal

communication.’

We shall now move to a letter written to Maganlal Gandhi (fn11) in-

Fn11: Maganlal Gandhi, nephew of M K Gandhi and brother of Chhaganlal Gandhi. He wasalso engaged in publication of Indian Opinion and printing press at Phoenix.


http://www.gandhiserve.org/pg.html/


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Source: http://www.gandhi-manibhavan.org/gandhicomesalive/comesalive_associatessouthafrica.htm#

December 1910(R24). In this short letter, written in Gujarati, M K Gandhi

had given some instructions relating to the publication of Indian Opinion.

In this short and simple letter the sender being a senior member in the

family hierarchy, maintained the traditional line by addressing ‘Chi’(for

Chiranjibi) to the recipient and tendering his ‘blessings’ as he signed off. In

the body of the letter the sender discussed about the materials he was

sending for the publication. From the contents of the letter, it appeared

that, the sender was constantly sending materials.

Then at a point, he used ‘please’ while instructing the recipient to do a

work if he could. Perhaps, the sender was not sure about the capacity of

the receiver to do the work he was assigning and hence used ‘please’ with

the qualification at the end of the sentence ‘if you can.’ He ended the letter

with “let us see what happens.” This implies that, both the communicants

were undertaking works in tandem and hence had a common frame of

reference. Besides, this indicates the commonality of both the

communicants on understanding each others’ frame of mind at the

psychological level.

Now a letter sent by Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (from Lawley in

Transvaal) to his elder son Harilal Gandhi (in Ahmadabad in India) in

October 16, 1912 (R25). The letter was written in reply to Harilal’s letter.

The letter in Gujarati M K Gandhi mentioned the date as ‘Aso Sud 6 as

per the Hindu Calender which falls on Oct 16, 1912. Prefixed‘Chi’(for

Chiranjibi) to his son’s name i.e. ‘Chi.Hiralal’ in his address and then went

on to write, as if he was in face -to-face conversation with his son.


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In the beginning, M K Gandhi, the father, expressed his displeasure over

the casual attitude of the recipient in reciprocating his letters. He also

expressed his unhappiness over certain issue that the recipient did not

undertake as instructed. The sender then reasoned out his version and

made it clear that they would discuss the matter ‘if and when we meet.’

Having had discussed the issue pertaining to work, the father then move

to personal level and expressed his wish as to what Harilal should do in

strengthening his character. This was in reference to the passion Harilal

had towards his wife. It appeared that, Harilal had informed his father

about this and in turn, his father was advising him to maintain

‘brahmacharya(fn12)’ with rigor to overcome his passion. He also made it

clear that the fault for this kind of behaviour does not lie with the place

(i.e. Ahmadabad). He then, on the basis of Harilal’s letter, inferred that

‘Chanchi (fn13) will not now be able to come here for a couple of years.’

He then ended his letter by extending his ‘blessings’ and then putting

‘Bapu(meaning father)’ at the end. According to Trenholm and Jensen

(2008), three levels of information are exchanged during communication

process namely Cultural, Social and Psychological. While general

information which can be applied to all the members of a given culture is

shared between interactants, it is called cultural level data. At this

juncture, through the interactants opened a communication channel, it is

at the rudimentary stage. However when the interactants indentify each

other on the basis of their membership to certain social group or

community, they use their social level data.

Fn12: Brahmacharya: It is the yogic practice of celibacy. Source: Willis., J. S. (Eds).(2002). The Joy of

Yoga. Marlowe & Company, New York.

Fn13: Chanchal, wife of Harilal Gandhi. Source:http://gandhiking.ning.com/profiles/blogs/mahatma-gandhi-and-his-son-harilal-1



http://gandhiking.ning.com/profiles/blogs/mahatma-gandhi-and-his-son-harilal-1

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This is the level that moves the communication to the next level and

enables the participants to understand each other better. But as individuals

rely on each others’ personal attributes, they are in a better position to

understand each other. At this level they were sharing psychological level

data.

Communications when cultural level and social level data is shared can be

termed as impersonal communication as at these level interactants relate

each other on the basis of their social attributes and share information that

suits the socio-cultural settings. On the other hand, in interpersonal

communication, participants relate to each other as unique persons and

construct their message based on the psychological information about the

other i.e. feeling, attitude, distinguishing traits.

From the start we know that it was a communication between a father and

his son and that the father wrote this letter in reply to his son’s. It is also

known that both living thousand miles apart were in touch with each other

through letters. On the basis of these, the interpersonal character of this

letter is established. However, as we analyse the letter on the basis of

interpersonal communication on theoretical perspectives, we found that, the

letter has all kind of data i.e. cultural, social and psychological. The use of

mother tongue in writing the letter, use of terms that were more specific to

the communicant’s culture and religion (i.e. use of Hindu calendar date,

addressing his son as Chiranjibi, addressing Chanchal as Chanchi etc.)

could well fall under the cultural level data where as the references made to

different people fall under the social level data. The displeasure explicitly

and implicitly, advises and caution over certain things could fall under



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psychological data as they had the potential to affect the recipient at his

mental level.



107

References:

R1: Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi (CWMG) Vol-1, P-205,Ministry of Information & Broadcasting, Govt. of India. New Delhi

R2: ibid, Vol 2, p-367

R3: ibid, Vol 2, p-406

R4: ibid, Vol 5, P-415



R7: ibid, Vol 10, P-233


R9: ibid Vol 2, P-462 & 463

R10: ibid, Vol 4, P-318

R11: ibid, Vol 4, P-346


R13: Burleson. B.R. (2010), The nature of Interpersonal Communcation(p154), The handbook of Communication Science. Sage


R15: ibid, Vol 9, P-432,433

R16 :ibid, Vol 10, P-360,361

R17: ibid, Vol 12, P-392, 393

R18: ibid, Vol 05, P-348,349

R19: ibid, Vol 11, P-57,58

R20: ibid, Vol 04, P-424,425

R21: ibid, Vol 06, P-400

R22: ibid, Vol 09, P-10,11



108

R23: Desai, M.(Eds)(1932). My Early Life: An Illustrated Story. OxfordUniversity Press.


R25: ibid, Vol 12, P-264



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Part-II

Letters selected in phase-2 includes letters written by Gandhi between

1914 A.D. and 1930 A.D. i.e. when he returned from South Africa to

India till the Salt Satyagraha. Amongst the 100 letters selected, Gandhi

wrote 15 letters to family members, 60 letters to political co-workers and

freedom fighters, 05 letters to friends, 01 letter to the press, 05 letters to

Government officials and 14 letters to others, that include letters to

people who have corresponded with him, to ashram children etc.. First we

shall discuss about the letters M K Gandhi wrote to family members.

A letter written to Narandas Gandhi(fn1) in June 1905 (R1), Mohandas K

Gandhi gave certain instructions to the recipient and then asked him to

join the ashram, if he has faith in it. The letter was written in Gujarati. The

instructive way of writing was evident from the fact that Narandas was the

nephew of the sender and his two brothers were already working with him

(M K Gandhi) in South Africa. The familiarity of the communicants with

each other and their family link was also reflected from the references the

sender had made to the recipient. It appears from the letter that, the

intended recipient was coming to the sender’s place and hence the sender

had asked him to bring certain items along. The sender while referring

about the letter- where he had made certain remarks about Narandas- to

Kushalchand Gandhi, had also asked the recipient to think over it. And

then, as if he was instructing the recipient to join him in the Ashram,

wrote, “If you have unshaken faith in the Ashram, take the plunge.”

Fn1: Narandas was the son of M K Gandhi’s cousin Kushalchand Gandhi. He was thebrother of Chhaganlal and Maganlal Gandhi. Source:http://www.gandhiserve.org/pg.html



http://www.gandhiserve.org/pg.html

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While the sender had addressed the recipient as ‘chi’ (for chiranjibi) at the

beginning of the letter, he ended the letter by tendering his blessings with

his initial name ‘Mohandas’ at the end. This was the signing off pattern

that the sender had adopted in his letters to family members (especially

juniors) as was seen from his numerous letters in previous years (from

CWMG Vol 1-14).

Now we shall move to a letter written to Ramdas Gandhi (fn2) in

September 1924 (R2). The letter was written in Gujarati from New Delhi

where the sender had started 21 days fast for Hindu-Muslim unity. This is

a letter from a father to his son, where the son is studying at a distance

place, and the father was undertaking an extreme step of 21days fast for

Hindu-Muslim unity, which he termed as ‘atonement.’ According to

Oxford Dictionary, atonement means ‘a repair done for the sake of a

damaged relationship.’ On the other hand, as per the Christian theology,

atonement was the ‘reconciliation of god and mankind through the death

of Jesus.’

In the letter there was no explicit reference of Hindu-Muslim tension.

However, the sender in the first sentence wrote about his ‘atonement’ and

informed that the ‘fast’ shall last at least for 21 days. This in turn implied

that the fast is to achieve the atonement the sender spoke about. From the

references we know that the fast was for Hindu-Muslim Unity. Hence it

can safely be said that both the communicants had the same frame of

reference on the issue.

Fn2: Ramdas Gandhi, M K Gandhi’s third son. (1897 – April 14, 1969). He was bornin South Africa. He outlived his parents and all of his brothers. He and his wifeNirmala had three children; Sumitra Gandhi, Kanu Gandhi and Usha Gandhi. He wasactive in his father's Indian independence movement. Source:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramdas_Gandhi



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramdas_Gandhi

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The letter was written after the sender had started the fast. This could be

the reason that, the sender feared that his son might be scared after

knowing about it, asked not be scared and concentrate on his studies. In

fact he did not stop there. As if reprimanding his son, wrote “if you can’t

have patience, do run up here” and then advised him to keep patience.

Then as a philosophical overtone, he wrote about how human body

should be used to achieve maximum work. Perhaps this was written to

mellowing down the hard talk. Besides, this could have also been written

as a part of teaching a father was passing on to his son. He signed off the

letter by extending his blessing and writing ‘Bapu’ at the end.

The language of the letter, the concern and authority reflected through the

selection of words, the common references and the beginning and signing

off of the letter made it evident that the message was communicated.

Now we shall discuss a letter M K Gandhi had written to Nanabhai

Mashruwala(fn3) in February1927 (R3). This is a letter where the sender

discussed about the formalities regarding the wedding of his son with the

daughter of the recipient. The letter was in Gujarati and was written in

response to the telegram sent by Nanabhai. From this, it could be said that

both the communicants had language in common and were in touch with

each other through letters.

This letter could be termed as a classic case of relationship building where

the sender asserts that the new relationship, that is going to be formed

following the marriage of his son and Nanabhai’s daughter, would not

have any bearing on their old bonding where Nanabhai and his

Fn3: Nanabhai Mashruwala: Father of Sushila, who married to Manilal Gandhi, M KGandhi’s second son. Source: http://www.sahistory.org.za/sitas-story



http://www.sahistory.org.za/sitas-story

112

daughter were a part of ‘family.’ As per the Indian traditional, marriage is

celebrated with full fanfare and it is expected that the bridegroom and his

family & friends were served sumptuous meals by bride’s family during

the marriage ceremony. Besides, the bride was expected to bring ‘dowry.’

In this letter, M K Gandhi, the father of the ‘to be bride groom,’ wrote

about his disapproval of those social customs and asked the recipient not

to incur any expense on fanfare and food and not to gather a crowd. He

also advised his recipient not to give away any gold (dowry) to his

daughter. He in fact asked Nanabhai to confine the marriage ceremony

strictly to the religious rites and asked him for searching a ‘Panditji(fn4)’ to

complete the rites. At the backdrop his advocating for simplicity, the

sender knew that his son would be in foreign dress for which he (his son)

had taken permission, the sender compared his ‘to be daughter in-law’

with ‘Sita (fn5)’ when she wears Khaddar Sari and said he was going to gift

her with a takli (fn6), the Gita (fn7), and a copy of Bhajanawali.

Fn4: Pandit: a Hindu learned in Sanskrit and Hindu culture, philosophy and law. (TheChambers Dictionary)Fn5: Sita is the central female character of the Hindu epic Ramayana. She is theconsort of the Hindu god SriRama (avatar of Vishnu) and is an avatar of Lakshmi,goddess of wealth and wife of Vishnu. She is esteemed as a standard-setter for wifelyand womanly virtues for all Hindu women. Sita is known for her dedication, self-sacrifice, courage and purity. Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SitaFn6: Takli: the Takli is a very old spindle from India. It is small and has a brass whorl.It is excellent for spinning cotton and other fine, short fibers. The takli is very fast andefficient as well as inexpensive and portable. While this video details the use of a takli,these instructions apply to any kind of supported hand spindle.Source: Ghosh.,G.K.& Ghosh., S. (1995). Indian Textiles: Past and Present. APH Publishing Corporation. NewDelhi.Fn7: Gita: The Bhagavad Gita is technically part of Book 6 of the Mahabharata. It is adialog between the God Krishna and the hero Arjuna, taking place in a timelessmoment on the battlefield before the climactic struggle between good and evil. TheGita is a classic summary of the core beliefs of Hinduism.Sources: 1. http://www.sacred-texts.com/hin/gita/2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bhagavad_Gita


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sita

http://www.sacred-texts.com/hin/gita/


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At the beginning he addressed the recipient as ‘Bhaishri’ meaning brother-

and went on the express his happiness over the finalisation of the

date. He then discussed the nitty-gritty of the marriage and signed off his

letter by expressing his ‘blessings’ with ‘Bapu’ at the end. The letter did

not stop there. The sender then wrote his detailed tour programme with

‘PS’ in the parenthesis. b that the recipient was a family member and a

formal relationship was going to be formed. At places where the sender

wished to have some works done or want to request something, he puts a

‘please’ at the beginning of the sentence. On the other hand, at places

where he wanted to assert his authority, he simply wrote that way, like

“You must not give away with the bride so much as a grain of gold.”

However he substantiated this by stating reasons, in the subsequent

sentences.

In the letter there were references to religious rites, Panditji, Pandals,

Garland, Gita and Bhajanawali, which indicates the religious and

traditional affinity of the communicants. This notion was also confirmed

from the sender’s reference on gifting the Gita and Bhajanawali to the

bride. The sender had also written that he would be giving the bride a

garland of his hand spun yarn and also gifting her ‘takli.’ This implied that

the sender as was actively engaged in hand spun yarn making and wished

to instil the same habit with the bride. Seen in the perspective of the

freedom struggle, this could be said that the sender a strong votary of

Indians using hand spun cloths, was propagating and living to his stand,

even in the case of his son’s marriage. From the beginning at the sign in

address to the recipient to the end at the sign out blessings, the sender has

taken care in selecting his word and formed the sentences that could



114

effectively express his mind. This is the beauty of this letter, which has

potential to expresses every message, implicitly or explicitly to the receiver.

Now we shall move to a letter written to Mathuradas Trikumji (fn8) in

January 1926 (R4). In the Gujarati letter the sender addressed the recipient

as ‘Chi’ (for chiranjibi) and congratulated him for being permitted to take

walk. From this, it appeared that the recipient was unwell and bed-ridden

and the sender was closely monitoring his health condition. Upon

knowing that the recipient had progressed well and permitted for walk,

Gandhi congratulated him. The sender also advised the recipient to slowly

start climbing.

He then expressed his happiness by stating that “I am very happy that you

have started walking just when Taramati, is arriving there.” The sender

then signed off the letter by extending his blessings with his signature as

‘Bapu’ at the end.

The communicative language i.e. Gujarati, the address to the recipient at

the beginning and at the end, and the feeling that was expressed through

words by the sender indicates that the recipient was junior to the sender

but had a close rapport with him. This notion also gets credence from the

sender mentioning the name of recipient’s wife. The letter also indicates

that the sender was comfortable enough to give his suggestion to the

recipient. With all these factors, it could well be said that, the sender

meticulously selects his word and addresses suitably to people so that the

intended message could reach the recipient.

Now a letter M K Gandhi had written to his son Manilal and -

Fn8: Mathuradas Trikumji: M K Gandhi’s grand nephew. Source: Gandhi., R. (2006).Mohandas: True Story of a Man, His People and an Empire. Penguin, UK.



115

daughter in law Sushila Gandhi in August 1929 (R5). The letter was in

Gujarati and was written in response to letters by both the recipients.

Noteworthy here that Manilal and Sushila were in South Africa and were

taking care of the press and publication of Indian Opinion there.

In the beginning the sender addressed his son by his nick name ‘mani’

with a ‘chi’ at the prefix of Mani & Sushila and then acknowledged of

receiving their ‘short’ letters. He then wrote that he was ‘content’ with such

short letters. From these two sentences it appears that, Gandhi, the father,

was eagerly awaiting to hear from his son and daughter-in-law and by

writing that he was content with such short letters, hinted that they should

find time to write short letters in regular interval. This reflects the concern

and affection of a father. In the next sentence, he advised them not to

worry about his health and informed them about his day-to-day activities

to regain health. The sender also informed the recipient about the where

about of his (Manilal) brothers and other activities being taken by different

people. At the end he wrote “I am ‘eager’ to know what you two have

finally decided.”

Even though it is not explicitly known as to what he meant from this last

sentence, it appears that, sender by detailing his other sons’ active

participation in works initiated by him, might have asked Manilal to join

him and was awaiting his and sushila’s response to this effect. The sender

then ended the letter with his signature ‘Bapu’ at the end.

The sentences at the beginning and in the end summed up the feelings of

a father towards his son and daughter in-law. The remaining texts in-

between were just to supplement and compliment this feeling. Given the



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fact that the letter was written in their mother tongue, it sure had a

multiplying effect in communicating the message to the intended

recipients. The sender, being the father, did not take any formality in

signing off the letter but abruptly put his signature ‘Bapu’(meaning father)

as he completed writing.

Here is a letter M K Gandhi wrote to Prabhudas Gandhi (fn9) in February

1930(R6). This letter was in Gujarati and was written after receiving a

letter from the recipient. In the letter, the sender has given numerous

advice to the recipient. It appears from the letter that the recipient was

unwell and was undergoing treatment and hence M K Gandhi advised him

to abide by the treatment schedule. Given the fact that Prabhudas was the

grandchild of the sender was directly under M K Gandhi’s care since his

birth in South Africa, the concerns reflected in the letter over the

recipient’s health and the suggestions thereupon could be understood.

This is also the reason that at the beginning he addressed him with ‘Chi’

and signed off the letter by tendering his blessings with his signature as

‘Bapu’ at the end. The same signing in and signing off patter was followed

in another letter to Jamnadas Gandhi (fn10) at Rajkot in Kathiawar on

April 20,1930 (R7) in the beginning and at the end. However in the body,

the approach was little different. In the Gujarati letter, the sender

informed the recipient that he was expecting his letter and asked him to

write letters in regular interval detailing all the works he was doing.

Fn9: Prabhudas Gandhi: Son of Chhaganlal Gandhi. Prabhudas Gandhi: Son ofChhaganlal Gandhi. Source: Hofmeyr., I. (2013). Gandhi’s Printing Press: Experimentsin slow Reading. Harvard College, USA.

Fn10: Jamnadas Gandhi: Son of Kushalchand Gandhi and nephew of M K Gandhi.He was the brother of Chhaganlal Gandhi. Source: Tidrick., K. (2006). Gandhi: APolitical and Spiritual Life. I.B.Tauris & Company Limited. New York.



117

In between, he enquired- about his health and hoped that the recipient

was doing good work. From this it appears that Jamnadas was engaged in

the movement in Rajkot and given the fact that the sender was leading the

movement across the country, he was eager to hear from the recipient

about the movement on regular basis. Besides, the sender expressed his

desire that the recipient’s father should join the ‘movement’ and wrote ‘it

is pure ‘Dharma’ to join it. From this it appears that the recipient’s father

was hesitant to join the movement and hence the sender had cited his

understanding of ‘Dharma’ (virtue or righteousness arising from observance of social

or moral law-the chambers dictionary) to influence him to join. Besides,

expressing his desire through the recipient could also be seen as an effort

to convince his cousin through his son. Even though this was a letter to a

member of his family, it more or less revolved around the movement. But

the writer had taken care in maintaining the courtesy.

NOW we shall move to letters M K Gandhi wrote to freedom fighters

and his co-workers. Here is a letter written by Gandhi to Valji G. Desai

(fn11) in May 1918 (R8). The short letter was in Gujarati and was sent

from Motihari (in Bihar). In the letter, the sender had discussed about the

salary the recipient would accept for his service. The sender addressed the

recipient as ‘Bhaishri’ followed by his initial name i.e. ‘Valji’ and then

informed him about the discussion he had with ‘Panditji’ regarding the

salary to be paid to him (Valji). Mentioning an amount he had suggested,

Fn11: Val G. Desai: was a close associate of Mahatma Gandhi. He was an Englishlecturer in Gujrat College Ahmadabad, Gujrat, India. He reigned from service and joinedMahatma Gandhi for constructive work. He was a one of the best translator. So hetranslated Satyagraha in South Africa. Source:http://www.internationalpeaceandconflict.org/profiles/blogs/val-g-desai-and-mahatma-gandhi


http://www.internationalpeaceandconflict.org/profiles/blogs/val-g-desai-and-mahatma-


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which he thought was not acceptable to ‘Panditji’, Gandhi asked the

recipient to mention the minimum amount he would accept as salary. He

signed off the letter with ‘Bandemataram(fn12) from’ with his initial name

‘Mohandas’ at the end.

From the history of Indian freedom struggle we know that ‘Vande

Mataram’ (meaning worshipping the mother or motherland) was the

slogan used by the freedom fighters to greet each other. The signing off

the letter using the slogan signifies the same spirit.

Given the fact that the recipient was being offered a job and that too,

perhaps related to the activities of freedom struggle, Gandhi deliberately

mentioned a figure with the qualification that it might not be feasible.

With this he, instead of suggesting any amount, put the onus on Valji to

speak the amount he would accept. By doing this, he in one hand,

communicated the message and on the other, took care of the ego of Valji

by putting the onus on him. The language in which the letter was written

and the use of words and fact & figures have made this short letter a good

communication medium having the full potential to deliver the message.

In another letter written to Bhagwanji Anoopchand Mehta in September

1918 (R9), Gandhi discussed about his illness and what he was thinking

about as he was recovering. The letter in Gujarati was written from

Sabarmati Ashram and the date was ‘Bhadrava Vad 7.’ In the beginning

Fn12: Bandemataram: - literally - "I praise thee, Mother" - is a poem from BankimChandra Chattopadhyay's 1882 novel Anandamath It was writtenin Bengali and Sanskrit. It is a hymn to the Mother Land. It played a vital role inthe Indian independence movement, first sung in a political context by RabindranathTagore at the 1896 session of the Indian National Congress.In 1950 the song's firsttwo verses were given the official status of the "national song" of the Republic ofIndia, distinct from the national anthem of India, Jana Gana Mana.Source:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vande_Mataram



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vande_Mataram

119

Gandhi addressed his recipient as dear Bhagwaniji and at the end signed

off the letter by writing the slogan ‘Vandemataram from’ with his initial

name Mohandas at the end. This is the same pattern as was discussed in

the letter to Velji.

The crux of the letter was that the sender was ill and recouping in the

Ashram. He however informed the recipient that Kathiawar was

constantly in his mind but he was unsure about his work he would be

doing at Kathiawar at the time of writing the letter. As it is already evident

that the letter was related to freedom struggle, it appears from it that

Bhagwaniji, the recipient had urged Gandhi to visit Kathiawar on work

related to freedom struggle to which Gandhi wrote the letter informing his

state of affairs of his health and mind.

The letter was in Gujarati and carried Hindu calendar date. This had the

inherent message of intimacy that was communicated to the recipient.

Besides by writing that he was constantly thinking about Kathiawar, the

sender again reassured that notion. Needless to say, Gandhi was a

Kathiawari (fn13).

Here is a letter M K Gandhi wrote to Shankarlal Banker (fn14) in

October 1919 (R10). This letter was in Gujarati and written from Lahore

in response to a letter from Shankarlal. At the beginning Gandhi

addressed the recipient as ‘Dear Shankarlal’ where as at the end he signed

off the letter by writing the slogan ‘Vandemataram’ followed by his initial-

Fn13: Gandhi., M, K. (1929). Source: My Experiment with Truth. The CollectedWorks of Mahatma Gandhi, Vol 44. P-92, Publication Division, Ministry of I &B,New Delhi.Fn14: Shankarlal Banker: One of the first and most loyal recruits of M K Gandhi.He played a major role in textile labour struggle in Ahmadabad along with AnasuyaSarabhai. Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shankarlal_Banker



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shankarlal_Banker

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name i.e. ‘Mohandas.’ From the letters it appears that this was the pattern

Gandhi had adopted to communicate with people active in freedom

struggle. Unlike his letters to HSL Polak or Millie Graham Polak where

Gandhi addressed the recipient as ‘my dear’, here he addressed the

recipient as ‘dear.’ This indicates that, though Shankarlal was a close

confident of Gandhi, he was not as close as Polak or Millie.

In the letter, Gandhi acknowledged of receiving a letter from Banker and

assured the recipient that he had all his blessings. It appeared that,

Shankarlal in his letter had wished for Gandhi’s blessings and hence the

former had reassured him of this. Gandhi then appreciated the nature of

the recipient and wished that he would achieve

success. Gandhi enquired about the health of the recipient and advised

him to take care of his health. He also informed the recipient about his

meeting the governor and his scheduled visit to Delhi. Gandhi informed

the recipient that he (Gandhi) won’t be able to come to the recipient’s

place and hence asked him to do all the works he was assigned. In fact

showing his complete faith in the ability of Bankar, wrote ‘Relieve me

from the anxiety about things there.’

The letter though small, it appears had effectively conveyed the message.

and the message was that the recipient should take care of all the work

even in the absence of the sender.

The sender’s appreciation of the recipient’s nature and enquiring about his

health could be seen as a confidence building measure where as by

informing his itinerary, the sender, it appeared place the recipient in the

loop. He then asked the recipient to take care of all the work. He in fact,



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tried to give a moral boost to the recipient by writing that he would be

relieved from the anxiety once the latter controls the affairs.

In a letter to Manibehn Patel (fn15) from Deolali in May 15, 1926 (R11),

Gandhi address the recipient by her nickname ‘Mani’ with ‘chi’ as the

prefix. The language of the letter was Gujarati. In the short letter, the

sender used small sentences and each sentence carries single information.

by this way, he made the letters simple and straight. In the first sentence

he informed the recipient that he could persuade Ba(fn16), but in the

subsequent sentence he made it clear that she would not moving

immediately but in a later date. He then asked the recipient to make this

known to certain women. From the initial address to the recipient with her

nickname and the subsequent three sentences, it appears that the recipient

was junior as well as dear to the sender and Gandhi wrote this letter in

response to a letter by Manibehn requesting him to send Kasturaba to the

Ashram. In the fourth sentence Gandhi expressed his hope about her

getting satisfaction from her ward and in the next he advised her to be a

good mixer. From this appears that the recipient was in-charge of some

wards in the Ashram and the sender was advising her to mix with the

inmates. Confident that the recipient had the information about the

change of programme the sender just enquired about it. He then signed

Fn15: Maniben Patel : She was an Indian independence movement activist and aMember of the Indian parliament.She was the daughter of Indian leader and a freedomfighter, Sardar Patel. Manibehn adopted the teachings of Mahatma Gandhi in 1918,and started working regularly at his ashram inAhmedabad.Source:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maniben_Patel &http://alphaideas.in/2013/10/29/nehru-treated-sardar-patels-daughter/Fn16: Ba: Kasturaba Gandhi, M K Gandhi’s wife. He affectionately addressed her asBa, the last two letters of her name. Source: The Collected Works of MahatmaGandhi, Publication Division, Ministry of I &B, New Delhi.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maniben_Patel&

http://alphaideas.in/2013/10/29/nehru-treated-sardar-patels-daughter/


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off the letter by extending his blessings with his signature as ‘Bapu’ at the

end.

From the contents in the letter it could be summarised that the recipient

was junior to the sender and was new to the Ashram but was familiar to

the sender and his family. This could be the reason that the sender

discusses several matters with her quite freely as well as tendered advised

on some issues. Given the fact that feelings could be communicated better

in one’s mother tongue, the sender wrote the letter in Gujarati, the mother

tongue of both.

Now we shall move to a letter written to Devchand Parakh (fn17) in

October 1926 (R12). The letter was in Gujarati and in this letter the sender

addressed the recipient as ‘Bhaishri’ as a prefix to his name and also added

‘Bhai’ i.e. Bhaishri Devchand Bhai.

While Bhaishri was a ‘honorary’ term used to convey the feelings of the

sender, the ‘Bhai’ at the suffix was a term used by the Gujarati community

to address all the male members. By putting these two terms, the sender

established touched upon sentimental chord and community feeling of the

recipient. It appears from the contents of the letter that, Gandhi wrote this

letter in response to a letter by Devchand Parakh. Gandhi enquired about

the matter Devchand had raised in his letter. In the subsequent sentence

he asked him to take control of an Ashram, where he (Devchand) was a

trustee. In fact, Gandhi asked him “You should take control of it

‘openly.’” This reflects the authority at which the sender asked the

Fn17: Devchand Parakh: Devchand Uttamchand Parekh of Jetpur, a friend and co-worker of M K Gandhi who gave Bapu the name, Mahatma in 1915. Source:http://www.ahmedabadmirror.com/index.aspx?page=article&sectid=3&contentid=20090425200904250332151482d5cf072


http://www.ahmedabadmirror.com/index.aspx?page=article&sectid=3&contentid=20


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recipient to act.The sender then signed off the letter by writing the slogan

‘Vandemataram’ with his sign as ‘Bapu’ at the end. As it was evident from

the earlier letters that, Gandhi used to sign off letters with this slogan to

people engaged in ‘freedom struggle’, here the use of it implied that,

Devchand was also engaged in the movement. Taken the context of the

letter, the nuances used by the sender and the references made indicates

that the message was delivered and interpersonal communication was

established through the letter.

Now we shall move to a letter to Shivabhai Patel written in December 16,

1926 from Wardha [(fn18) (R13)]. The letter was written in response to a

letter by the latter and this was duly acknowledged by the sender. The

language of the letter was Gujarati. From the contents of the letter, it

appears that the recipient was thinking of atonement for an involuntary

ejaculation for the reason that he was practicing ‘Brahmacharya (fn19)’

and hence was seeking guidance from the sender. Gandhi in his address to

the recipient used ‘Bhai (meaning brother)’ twice. One as a prefix to his name

and the second was suffixed. While the prefix was used as a honorary

address, where the sender found the receiver in equal footing in terms of

age and seniority, the ‘Bhai’ in suffix was a terminology used in Gujarati

for addressing the male members in the society. The sender had taken care

Fn18: Wardha district is one of the 35 districts in Maharashtra state inwestern India. This district is a part of Nagpur Division. They included Wardha in theCentral Provenance. Wardha is a sister city for Sevagram, and both were used as majorcenters for the Indian Independence Movement, especially as headquarters for anannual meet of the Indian National Congress in 1934, and Mahatma Gandhi's Ashram.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wardha_district

Fn 19: Brahmacharya: It is the yogic practice of celibacy. Source: Willis., J. S.(Eds).(2002). The Joy of Yoga. Marlowe & Company, New York.


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of the social and cultural norms in addressing the recipient. He however

tendered his blessings at the end of the letter with his signing off signature

as ‘Bapu.’ This could be due to the fact that the recipient was seeking

guidance from the sender and hence the sender placed himself in an upper

position. In his letter, Gandhi observed that no penance was required as

the ejaculation was involuntary and occurred unconsciously. He however,

instructed the recipient as to what he should do following the incident. He

also advised him to limit his desire for food and snacks.

After signing off the letter, Gandhi added [PS (please see)] at the end

where he enquired about the recipient’s brother. In the next sentence he

wrote that he had not revised the letter after writing it. This implies that

the sender had forgotten to enquire about the recipient’s brother in the

main body of his letter but added it as an afterthought. On the other hand,

from the second sentence he took the excuse for the mistakes that might

have occurred in the letter. From the whole of the letter it appeared that

Gandhi dealt the letter in a manner as if it was between a sinner and an

astute person and accordingly the sender selected his words in the letter.

Here is a letter written to Lajpat Rai (Fn 20) on April 30, 1927 (R14). The

letter was in English and was written in response to a letter by Lajpat Rai.

In the letter, Gandhi addressed the recipient with ‘Dear’ as a prefix to his

popular nickname ‘Lala’ and a ‘ji’ is suffixed to it. While the ‘dear’ was an

Fn20: Lajpat Rai: Lala Lajpat Rai was one of the greatest leaders of India'sindependence movement. He sacrificed his life while protesting against the arrival ofSimon Commission to India.Source:http://www.culturalindia.net/leaders/lala-lajpat-rai.htmlhttp://rrtd.nic.in/biolalalajpat.html &http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lala_Lajpat_Rai


http://www.culturalindia.net/leaders/lala-lajpat-rai.html


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indication of the writer’s affection towards the latter, the ‘ji’ was a symbol

of honour. Hence it could be said that Gandhi through his address

expressed his affection and honour explicitly towards the sender.

In the body of the letter, Gandhi informed of receiving his (Rai’s) letter

and trust (fn21) papers and congratulated him for the decision. He then

mentioned about money and wrote ‘This amount, I am afraid, will not be

sufficient; we will require yet more funds.” This is perhaps in reference to

Rai’s wish to build a hospital in memory of his mother with the available

fund at hand with the trust and Gandhi was expressing his assessment

over it and advised him to wait.

It appears from the letter that, Rai had sent the trust papers to Gandhi to

inform him about the decision as well as to get some guidance. This could

be reason that Gandhi while congratulating him, advised him to wait till

more funds are collected.

He then signed off the letter by writing ‘yours’ with his name M

.K.Gandhi at the end. Here Gandhi did not mention about

‘Vandemataram’ or ‘Bapu.’ This, despite the fact that, Lajpat Rai was

actively engaged in freedom struggle. The change in style could be due to

the context the letter was written. Here the context was relating to the

formation of trust and related activities. Besides, Gandhi signed as ‘Bapu’

in all those letters that were sent to people junior to him. However, given

the fact that Rai was senior to him, he signed his full name at the end.

From this it may be said that the sender took full care in using proper -

Fn21: Lajpat Rai's mother, Gulab Devi, died of tuberculosis in Lahore. In 1927, LajpatRai established a trust in her memory to build and run a tuberculosis hospital forwomen, reportedly at the location where she had died. This became known as theGulab Devi Chest Hospital and opened on 17 July 1934. Source :http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lala_Lajpat_Rai



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address at the beginning and at the end. Besides, the context decides the

writing pattern which also enhances the receptability the message. Now

we shall move to a letter to Annie Besant (fn22) written in April 1920

(R15) from Sabarmati Ashram. In this short letter Gandhi addressed her

as ‘Dear Dr. Besant’ and then thanked her for the note she had written.

He then went on to express his inability to join the movement Besant had

written about. But he took sufficient care in selecting words to mellow the

impact of his denial in participating the movement, when he wrote “I may

not join the movement...” instead of ‘I won’t join the movement...”

Gandhi then went on to reason as to why he might not be able to join the

movement and signed off the letter by writing ‘yours sincerely’ with his full

name at the end. This is perhaps in respect to Dr. Besant who had a

multifaceted personality and was instrumental in the formation of

Congress in India.

Now we shall move to a letter written to C. Rajgopalachari (fn23) in

January 1929 (R16). The letter was written from Sabarmati Ashram and

was written in response to a letter by the latter. This is one of the few

letters by M K Gandhi where he did not use any formal address for the

recipient at the beginning nor went by any formality while signing off the

letters. From the beginning it appears that the recipient, in his letter, had –

Fn22: Annie Besant: was a prominent British socialist, political reformer, women'srights activist,theosophist and Indian nationalist. Source:http://www.biographyonline.net/women/annie-besant.htmlFn23: C Rajagopalchari: was an Indian lawyer, independence activist, politician, writerand statesman. Rajagopalachari was the last Governor-General of India. He also servedas leader of the Indian National Congress, Premier of the Madras Presidency,Governor of West Bengal, Minister for Home Affairs of the Indian Union and ChiefMinister of Madras state. Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C._Rajagopalacharihttp://www.karnatik.com/co1081.html


http://www.biographyonline.net/women/annie-besant.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C._Rajagopalachari


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-enquired about the affairs of the Congress and Gandhi in his letter had

responded to it. Gandhi in the last paragraph also discussed about his

health and the food he was taking. This implies that the recipient was

someone who was concerned about Gandhi’s health and hence the sender

had written about his health with detailed diet he was taking. In fact at last

he maintained that he was keeping well. At the end, the sender wrote

about the enclosure and wrapped up the letter with address of the

recipient at Gandhi Ashram, Tiruchengdu. Here, Gandhi put ‘sjt’ (for

Sriyukta in Devnagari for honourable) before the name of C.

Rajgopalachari. Given the fact that ‘shri’ or ‘Sriyukta’ was used as a prefix

to someone’s name in Indian language to express one’s respect or

affection, the use of ‘sjt’ before C. Rajgopalchari’s name by M K Gandhi

implies that the sender had deep affection towards the latter.

Hence it could well be said that communicants shared good personal

relationship and hence were concerned about each other. This is perhaps

the reason that, the sender did not explicitly discuss about the affairs of

the Congress but had touched upon the issues with the hope that the

message would be properly understood and acted upon.

Now we shall move to a letter to Jawaharlal Nehru (fn 24) in June 1929

(R17). In the letter Gandhi address the recipient as ‘My Dear’ as a prefix

to his initial name Jawaharlal.’ This is exactly the way he used to address

Graham Polak and his wife Millie Polak. The Polaks were very close to

Gandhi. At the end, Gandhi signed off the letter by writing ‘Bapu.’ This -

Fn 24: Jawaharlal Nehru was a leader of India’s nationalist movement and becameIndia’s first prime minister after its independence. Source:http://www.biography.com/people/jawaharlal-nehru-9421253



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is the pattern, Gandhi used to write to people junior to him or family

members and friends. The signing in and signing out addresses by the

sender has made it clear that the recipient was very close to him. In the

body part of the letter, Gandhi discussing about the affairs of the

movement they both were engaged in. However, the tone and tenor of his

writing was suggestive where he was asking the recipient to do something.

At the end he also named the family members of the recipient and

enquired about them. This also implies that the sender knew the family

members of the recipient and by enquiring about them in his letter, it

appears that he tried to touch upon the sentimental chord of the recipient.

From all these, it could well be said that the interpersonal communication

has successfully communicated the message.

Here is a letter M K Gandhi wrote to Satish Chandra Dasgupta (fn25) in

November 17, 1929 (R18) from Allahabad. From the address of the

sender it appears that the letter was written when the sender was camping

at Allahabad. In this letter also, Gandhi addressed the recipient as ‘My

Dear’ with his initial name ‘Satish.’ This was followed by ‘Babu,’ a

customary honorary term used for Bengali gentleman in India. As it is

already evident from his numerous letters that Gandhi used the term ‘My

Dear’ to only those people very close to him, it is clear that the recipient

falls in that category. Besides, the use of honorary terms with his name

implies that the sender also has regards for the latter. Gandhi signed off -

Fn25: Satish Chandra Dasgupta – A Gandhian and very close associate of MahatmaGandhi. Founder of Khadi Prathistan (1925) at Sodepur and associate with AcharyaPrafulla Chandra Ray and Bengal Chemical. Mahatma Gandhi used to describe thisinstitution as his second home and visited here on number of times. Source:http://www.barrackpore.gov.in/HTM/sdobkp_profile.htm &http://www.tribuneindia.com/2000/20000513/windows/fact.htm


http://www.barrackpore.gov.in/HTM/sdobkp_profile.htm&


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his letter with ‘your sincerely’ followed by ‘Bapu’ at the end. This also

justified the notion that Gandhi had a very cordial relation with the

recipient but simultaneously he also had regard for him.

In the body part, the sender replied point-by-point to the matters raised by

the recipient in his letter. He then expressed his solidarity with the

recipient in facing the sorrow and worries and wished that he had the

strength to face them. Gandhi then mentioned about a letter from one

Ram Vinod and informed Satish that he was taching the copies of the

letter as well as his (Gandhi’s) reply and wanted to know whether he

(Gandhi) had represented Satish’s position correctly. This was perhaps

done in a move to maintained clarity so that there would be no

misunderstanding. This also reflects that the communicants had clear

understanding amongst themselves on dealing with matters with clarity.

From the above it could well be said that the letter was not a formal but

personal in nature and establishes the interpersonal character of

communication.

Now we shall move to a letter M K Gandhi wrote to the Press on Delhi

Tragedy in April 03, 1919 (R19). The letter was written to THE

BOMBAY CHRONICLE with the objective to reach out the Satyagrahis

on their conduct and also to make his position clear on the action of the

government on Satyagrahis, who were opposing the Rowlatt Legislation.

In the first sentence of the letter Gandhi sought ‘hospitality’ of the

columns of the newspaper to make some remarks on the aforesaid subject.



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According to the Chambers Dictionary, ‘Hospitality’ means friendly welcome and

entertainment of guests or room or suit where guests, delegates etc., are welcomed and

entertained.

Hence Gandhi, by seeking hospitality, implicitly sought friendly welcome

and space in the newspaper columns for his remarks. As the letter was

published by the several newspapers including THE BOMBAY

CHRONICLE, as was evident from the footnotes in CWMG, it could

well be said that, Gandhi had a positive impact on the newspaper editors

to publish matter. It appears that the initial sentence might have some

impact on the editors in getting it published.

For the ready reference of the editor, Gandhi noted down the allegations

against the Satyagrahis’- based on which the administration resorted to

firing on them- point by point and then reasoned out as to why he was

disapproving the first three points. Now having had the first hand

experience of the incident, he however, giving the benefit of the doubt,

observed that even if the allegations were true, the action of the

administration was unjustified. To this, Gandhi wrote, ‘but assuming the

truth of all the allegations, it does appear to me that the local authorities in

Delhi have made use of a Nasmyth hammer to crush a fly.’ The use of

this phrase defined the intention of the message too clearly.

He, knowing too well that, his every word would be scrutinised minutely

by the media, public and the government, and would have deep impact on

the movement, choose to write that, the conduct of the public was

immature and inconsistence with the pledge of the movement, if the

allegations were true. He then described the charter of the Satyagraha and



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expected that the people engaged in the movement would abide by the

charter and continue the struggle till their goal is achieved.

Given the fact that the letter was written to the media, Gandhi, though

stood by the Satyagrahis, did try not to be seen as one sided. He presented

his views objectively and also try to give message to his intended audience

to adhere to non violence while continuing the struggle. As in the letter,

Gandhi denounced any form of violence and expected the Satyagrahis to

abide by the law, the media had no problem in publishing the letter. As it

is evident from the footnotes of CWMG that the letter was published by

several newspapers following its release through a news wire service, it

could be said that, Gandhi, by selecting the words, got space in the

newspapers as well as reach out his intended audience with his message.

Now we shall move to the letters Gandhi had written to government

officials.

Here is a letter Gandhi wrote to the jail superintendent, Yaravda Central

Prison (R20) in June 29, 1923. At the time of writing this letter, Gandhi

himself was lodged in a jail as a prisoner. This letter was written in

response to the communication made by the jail authorities to Gandhi

regarding flogging of certain prisoners in the jail.

This is the letter where Gandhi appreciated the action of the jail officials

in honouring his request in informing about certain incident. He then

discussed about similar incident earlier in the jail where prisoners were

flogged and his (Gandhi’s) request to the government to allow him to

meet the prisoners so that they could be induced to follow jail discipline.

Given the fact that the request was rejected and a similar incident

happened, Gandhi made it clear that he was deeply hurt by it and felt that



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the incident could have been avoided had he been allowed to meet the

prisoners.

He then went to threaten the government that he might be compelled to

take action, which might embarrass the government, if the government

did not reciprocate the spirit of his letter. Having threatened the

government of action, Gandhi then wrote that he, as a prisoner did not

wish to take any action that could put the government in an awkward

position. He then requested the jail authorities to get back to him at the

earliest and signed off the letter by writing ‘yours obediently’ with his full

signature at the end.

This is a case of letter communication where the sender first applies a feel

good factor by appreciating their action or work. Then in the body part,

he discussed the issue for which the letter was written and at the end part

of the letter he puts the unpleasant aspect. Though Gandhi was

threatening to take action if his requests were not accepted, he puts it in a

manner as if he was trying to avoid it but was being forced. He, in fact

tried to give the impression that embarrassing the government was not in

his mind. By writing so he while on one hand, tried to reasoned out as to

what his future course of action could be, and on the other, he also tried

to put the onus on the government for all that might happen.

The interpersonal character of this letter could be gauged from the fact

that, there was regular communication between the communicants and

hence they had a common frame of reference on the place and the issue.

Besides, the way the letter was written, it is clear that, the sender has

conviction that communication to the recipient was properly made and

hence expected his early reply.



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Here is another letter Gandhi wrote to the Viceroy of India in May 18,

1930 (R21). This letter was also written when Gandhi was in Yeravda

Central prison. The crux of the letter was that thousands and thousands of

people were being arrested by the British government for their peaceful

demonstration against the salt tax, the liquor tax and the import of foreign

cloths into India and to solve the issue the Viceroy of India had declared

for holding a Round Table Conference in last part of that year. Gandhi

being imprisoned for the same offences as his thousands of countrymen

had defended the causes and as to why those demonstrations should not

be termed as criminal. He even voraciously presented the stand point of

India as a free nation and made it clear that no round table conference

would be able to bring out any solution unless public sentiments are

honoured.

Gandhi addressed the Viceroy of India as ‘dear friend’ at the beginning of

the letter and he signed off the letter by writing ‘your sincere friend’

followed by his full name. This makes the letter communication friendly in

nature. This could be the reason that, Gandhi, while lodged as a prisoner

by the government whose head was the Viceroy of India, took the

‘friendly’ liberty and wrote such a straight forward letter where, he even,

denounced the policies of the government and advocated for ‘freedom of

India.’ In the initial paragraph Gandhi wrote that he was writing the letter

as he thought it as duty to express his opinion on the statement of the

Viceroy of India relating to organising the Round Table Conference.

Advocating for the movement, Gandhi wrote that it could not termed as

lawlessness or as a crime as there was no criminal motif. He in fact,

faulted the diagnosis by the Viceroy to the disease of India and wrote with

conviction that salt tax and liquor tax must go and import of foreign



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cloths must stop. He further wrote that “India must not live for England

but for live for herself, so as to enable her to make her contribution to the

world’s progress.”

In the letter Gandhi adopted a top-down approach where he discussed the

more recent problem at the beginning and then went on to discuss the

core issue at the end with sufficient justification and reasons. Given the

fact that the letter was intended for the head of the government, against

whose policies Gandhi and his followers were demonstrating peacefully,

there was no reason as to believe that the inherent message of the letter

was not properly reached to the intended recipient. In fact, Gandhi wrote

his stand point so bluntly that people in the knows, must have got the

message clearly.

Now we shall move to the letters Gandhi had written to others.

Here is a letter M K Gandhi had written to one Ismail Ahmed of Kholvad

in Surat in April 10, 1924 (R22). From the letter it appears that, Ismail

Ahmed was a general public who had expressed his views on Gandhi’s

decision on Bardoli (fn26) movement and Gandhi had reverted to him by

writing a letter with his views. In the letter, Gandhi addressed Ahmad as

‘dear friend’ and thanked him for his letters. He then informed the recipient

that his letters might be accommodated in the columns of ‘Young India.’

Given the fact that the recipient had a feeling that the Bardoli decision was

a blunder, Gandhi in his reply informed that he thinks otherwise-

Fn26: Bardoli, a small tahsil in Surat district in the Bombay Presidency. The All IndiaCongress Committee under the presidency of Vithalbhai Patel had decided to embarkon mass civil disobedience movement against the British government in year 1922.Source: The Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi, Vol. 26, P-60, PublicationDivision, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, Govt. of India.



135

and made it clear that he would repeat such blunders to retain his loyalty

to truth undiminished.

At the end Gandhi wrote the name of Ismail Ahmed and his address with

an ‘esq’ (for esquire) as a post fix to his name to give him due respect.

This was also to show that he (Gandhi) though did not concur with the

idea of Ismail, has no personal feeling against him and extended due

respect to him for his writing the letter and expressing his views freely.

This is a letter which was written to a commoner not known to Gandhi.

The person in his letter had termed the much ambitious civil disobedience

movement propagated by Gandhi in Bardoli, as a blunder. Expecting that

such feeling might be prevailing amongst other people also, Gandhi

thought it fit to publish the letter in his newspaper ‘Young India’ with his

reply so that his stand on the issue could be known to a wider public. This

could be the reason that Gandhi linked the bardoli movement to that of

truth and declared that repeat such blunder like Bardoli, if at all it is

considered as blunder by people like Ismail.

Now we shall move to a letter Gandhi wrote to one K Venkatesan of

Jamshedpur in April 15, 1926 (R23). The letter was written from

Sabarmati Ashram in response to a letter by Mr. Venkatesan. From

Gandhi’s letter, it appears that, Venkatesan in his letter had requested

Gandhi for providing free copies of ‘Young India’ to the Andhra

Dramatic and Literary society, where he was the honorary secretary.

Besides he had also asked Gandhi for providing him books of Gandhi in

English for free of cost or at subsidised rates.

In his reply, Gandhi addressed the recipient as ‘dear friend’ and

acknowledged of receiving his letter. He then bluntly made it clear that he



136

won’t be able to provide the subscription of ‘Young India’ free of cost to

the society. He however saw to it that his denial was not taken as a rude

statement and hence put a ‘sorry’ before it. As the society was interested in

the subscription of ‘Young India’, Gandhi with the objective of not

discouraging it then offered to provide the subscription at half of the cost.

In the subsequent sentences, Gandhi answered the points raised by Mr.

Venkatesan and then signed off his letter by putting ‘yours sincerely’

followed by the detailed postal address of the recipient. He however did

not put his signature or full name at the end.

This was the pattern in the letter to Ismail Ahmed also.

In the both the letters, which had been written to people who were not

known to Gandhi but had written letters to him for some reason or other,

Gandhi maintained the uniform pattern in addressing them as ‘dear friend’

at the beginning and putting an yours sincerely at the end without any formal

signature. In the body part, he expressed his position and views clearly

while maintaining basic courtesy in the language so as to make the

recipient comfortable and at ease.

We shall now move to another letter Gandhi had written in Gujarati to the

children of Ashram in May 23, 1927 (R24). This is a letter where there

was no signing in or signing out address to anybody. The context of the

letter was ‘Brahmacharya’ and Gandhi was advising the children of the

ashram to try to achieve this to best of their ability.

Knowing too well that he was writing to the children, the flow of the letter

was like story telling. In the beginning Gandhi linked ‘Brahmacharya’ to

that of God and then went on describing religious texts where

‘Brahmacharya’ had been termed as the supreme satisfaction.



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Observing that pleasure and satisfaction from worldly things would be

miniscule as compared to the pleasure one gets from ‘Brahmacharya’, as

described by the ‘Yogis’ and religious scriptures, Gandhi asked the

children to faith in their teachings and try to observe ‘Brahmacharya’ to

the best of their ability.

Here the communication objective was to reach out to the children with

the concept of ‘Brahmacharya’ in such a manner that they should

understand and accept it. There was no issue of courtesy involved here

hence Gandhi got rid of that aspect. He however focussed on the message

creation and delivery aspect. He devised his message in a manner as if he

was telling a story. The language was Gujarati, the mother tongue of most

of the Ashram inmates. There were references of religious texts and

religious people. There was also philosophical reference of pleasure from

spiritual feelings vs. Pleasure from worldly things. Having had said thus,

he, as the head of the Ashram, asked the children to repose their faith on

whatever he had written about and practice ‘Brahmacharya.’

Here is another letter Gandhi had written to one Bhupendranath Ghosh

in August 04, 1928 (R25). The letter was written in response to the

amendments suggested by Ghosh in Ashram rules through his letter to

Gandhi.

Here also Gandhi addressed the recipient as ‘dear friend’ and then thanked

Ghosh for his letter. The ‘thank’ was tendered in appreciation of his

suggestion as well as his concern for the Ashram. However with Gandhi

already contemplating changes in the Ashram rules and having had

published the proposed changes in his newspaper ‘Young India,’ he



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informed Ghosh that his suggestions could also be considered as and

when the changes are made.

As the recipient of the letter was not known to Gandhi but had made

some suggestions, Gandhi thanked him for his suggestion and concern

towards the Ashram and then wrapped up the letter. He signed off the

letter with ‘yours sincerely’ without any signature.

If we take another letter Gandhi had written to Emma Harker in August

28, 1928 (R26) we could see the pattern adopted by Gandhi in his letters

to people whom he did not know but corresponded on the basis of their

letters.

From the content, it appears that, Emma in her letter had wished to stay

in Gandhi’s Satyagraha Ashram as an inmate to which Gandhi invited her

to the Ashram to see for herself the life of Ashram to decide further

course of action. From the letter it appeared that Gandhi had gauged the

social status of Emma from her status and hence, was sure that she could

not be able to cope up with the situation. Hence in his letter, he while

inviting her to visit the Ashram to have a firsthand experience was also

detailing the hard Ashram life which required constant body labour.

Gandhi then wrapped up the letter with ‘yours sincerely’ followed by her

address.

Like earlier four letters, here also Gandhi addressed the recipient as ‘dear

friend’ and ended the letter with ‘yours sincerely’ without his name or

signature. In all these letters, Gandhi acknowledged receipt of each one’s

letter and only wrote those issues that were raised by the recipient in their

respective letters.



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Given the fact that in each case letters were directed to Gandhi and

Gandhi responded to each of them, it could well be said that there was

interpersonal communication. Besides, the frame of reference in each case

was different but the communicants were privy to it and hence, it appears,

understood the message.

As per the message centred perspective ‘interpersonal communication is

a complex social process in which participants establish a communicative

relationship, exchange message in an effort to generate shared meaning

and to achieve social goals.’

This implies the necessary condition for establishing interpersonal

communication, there must be communicative relationship between the

interactants i.e. both have similar of same area of reference to encode and

decode the intended message and reciprocate. This also holds true, for

communication through letters. In this case the source may assume that

his intention will be recognised and accepted by the recipient and the

recipient may well recognise the intended intention of the source and act

accordingly but may not signal his interpretations. Communication

between parties separated by time and space is possible because the

participants are intimately familiar with the nature of the communication

in shared time and space and thus can make necessary accommodations to

adjust for temporal or spatial separation.

Interpersonal communication, as per this perspective, is also a complex

process. Complex, because, the message has to be encoded by the sender

and decoded by the receiver. Unless the message is encoded keeping the

social perspective in mind and feedback is given with the same set of

social consideration, it conveys nothing. According to Burleson, ‘people



140

do not produce or interpret message as ends in themselves; rather they

engage in these activities to accomplish particular social goals.’ On the

basis of the above letters it could well be said that the communicants had

established interpersonal communication.



141

References:

R1: Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi, Vol. 15, P-20, Publication Division,

Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, Govt. of India.

R2: ibid, Vol. 29, P-167.

R3: ibid, Vol.38, P-124, 125

R4: ibid, Vol. 33, P-416

R5: ibid, Vol. 46, P-408,409

R6: ibid, Vol.48, P-346

R7: ibid, Vol.49, P-143

R8: ibid, Vol. 17, P-34

R9: ibid, Vol. 17, P-231

R10: ibid, Vol. 19, P-85

R11: ibid, Vol. 35, P-231

R12: ibid, Vol.36, P-412-413

R13: ibid, Vol. 37, P-416

R14: ibid, Vol.38, P-334

R15: ibid, vol.41, P-414

R16: ibid, vol.43, P-516

R17: ibid, vol. 46, P-85

R18: ibid, vol. 47, P-450

R19: ibid, vol.17, P-373

R20: ibid, vol. 26, P-432,433

R21: ibid, vol.49, P-284,285

R22: ibid, vol.27, P-214,215

R23: ibid, vol.35, P-74,75

R24: ibid, vol. 38, P-428

R25: ibid, vol.42, P-318

R26: ibid, vol. 42, P-411



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Part-III

Letters selected in phase-3 includes letters written by Gandhi between

1930 A.D. and 1948 A.D. i.e. aftermath of Salt Satyagraha till his death.

Amongst the 100 letters selected, Gandhi wrote 07 letters to family

members, 74 letters to political co-workers and freedom fighters &

friends, no letter to the press, 04 letters to Government officials and 15

letters to others, that include letters to people who have corresponded

with him, to children of freedom fighters and ashram inmates etc.. First

we shall discuss about the letters M K Gandhi wrote to family members.

First we shall discuss about the letters M K Gandhi wrote to family

members. Here is a letter Gandhi had written to Sushilabehn Gandhi (fn1)

in August 22, 1932 (R1). The language of the letter is friendly and it was

also reflected from the teasing language used by the sender on several

occasions.

As per his usual style in writing ‘Chi’ for people junior to him in the initial

address, here also Gandhi addressed Sushila as ‘Chi’ followed by her name

and at the end tendered his blessings with ‘Bapu’ as his signature. This

letter was written in response to a letter by Sushila. In the first line itself,

Gandhi termed her two page letter as too short and taunted here by calling

‘a lazy woman’ for this. Given the fact that the communication had an

Indian socio-cultural-custom setting, where customs dictated the language

of communication between elders and daughter-in-laws, this taunting-

Fn1: Sushilabehn Gandhi, wife of Gandhi’s second son Manilal Gandhi. Source: TheCollected Works of Mahatma Gandhi, Vol. 38, P-124, 125, Publication Division,Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, Govt. of India.



143

might look as a ‘reprimand’ in the first instant. However, when we look at

the whole contents of the letter, it came to us that Gandhi appreciated

Sushila’s judgement about people and her intuition. He also asked her to

exercise greater control over his son (Manilal), so that he could be saved

from falling into bad companion. Besides, the sender also informed the

recipient that he had asked his son to regard her equally as a life-

companion, a partrner and his better half, and not as a servant. From this,

it could be inferred that the initial ‘taunting’ was friendly and not a

nagging.

Having had written thus, Gandhi then pointing out the strength of Manilal

in handing the affairs of the printing press and water –treatment, and

wrote that Manilal should have the greater authorities in those fields and

expected that both of them should exercise influence over issues they

were good at. In fact, he expect that Sushila would understand what he

meant by writing so when she read out the letter to Manilal. He also

enquired about her health and wanted to know whether her sister was

writing letter to her or not.

From this it appears that, Gandhi implicitly asked Sushila to guide Manilal

and work as a life partner and companion but not to interfere in affairs of

the printing press and water-treatment mattes where the latter had a better

understanding. Simultaneously he was also passing the message to Manilal

to refrain from bad companion and heed to the advice of his wife and

treat her equally. Though we are inferring these aspects, Gandhi did not

write about it but only wrote that ‘they would understand about his

message’ when Sushila read out the letter to Manilal. From this it could be

said that the sender and the recipient had common understanding on



144

issues discussed in the letter and hence had the common area of reference.

Besides, even if, we discount the fact that the recipient was the daughter-

in-law of the sender, the content of the letters provides sufficient

understanding about their common area of reference and understanding,

their social objective and both have communicative relations also.

Here is a letter Gandhi had written to his wife Kasturaba Gandhi in April

18, 1934 (R2). The letter was in Gujarati and was written to her when she

was in jail and the sender was touring in Assam. Gandhi addressed her

with ‘Ba’ -the nick name he used to call her- drawn out from the last two

letters of her original name ‘Kasturaba.’

At first Gandhi acknowledge of receiving her letter the same evening and

wrote that he was writing the letter at 3.15 am. He then explained his

itinerary to her for the next couple of weeks with the promise that he

would be there to receive her when she was released. He in fact asked her

to write the date of release, it at all it was fixed, so that he could be there

to receive her. He then detailed about the activities of several persons

including that of freedom fighters and family members. Besides, Gandhi

also let her know about his health and enquired about her. He also

enquired about her religious semi-fast and wanted to know when she

would break it. At the end, concluded by writing ‘these days I am not able

to send a discourse.’ This implies that he used to write discourses to her

through the letters but in the present instance he could not.

From the first and last sentences, it appears that the sender was working

with tight time schedule and hence while he had to write the letter very

early in the morning, he was also not able to write discourse to his wife. In

fact, the first sentence justifies the last.



145

Given the fact that the recipient was in jail, the sender ensured that she

was provided with all the information that she might be interested in

knowing i.e. about their children, relatives, their place of residence, and

their movement. The language of the letter was as if both the

communicants were in direct conversation. Moreover, the sender had

enquired about her need of money, her health and availability of proper

food, her religious fast etc.. At the end, he tendered his ‘blessings for all’

to the jail inmates with his signature ‘Bapu.’

Unlike the previous letter where Gandhi wanted the recipient to infer the

meaning from his letter after reading it to her husband, in this case he

wrote everything that he wanted to convey. This could be because the

recipient in jail might not have information about much of the happenings

outside the jail which the sender was privy to. When he wrote that he

would be there when she was released from the jail, it was basically aimed

at giving her the emotional strength in the jail. As the husband, he had the

responsibility to do this and he did.

Here is a letter Gandhi wrote to Kishorelal G Mashruwala (fn2) in May 15,

1945 (R3). The letter was in Gujarati. Though Mashruwala became a

family member of Gandhi following Sushila’s marriage to Gandhi’s son

Manilal, he was a close aide of Gandhi before that, and remained so

afterwards also. This relationship was evident in this letter. Gandhi

addressed the recipient with ‘Chi’ at the beginning and tendered his

blessings with his signature ‘Bapu’ at the end.

Fn2: Freedom fighter and close associate of M K Gandhi. He was also the paternaluncle of Sushila, M K Gandhi’s daughter in law. Source:http://www.sahistory.org.za/sitas-story



http://www.sahistory.org.za/sitas-story

146

Given the fact that Gandhi addressed ‘chi’ (chiranjibi) to those who were

very junior to him, it is evident that the recipient was very junior to the

sender.

In this letter Gandhi devoted only two lines in the beginning enquiring

about the personal details of the addressee, like his and his wife’s health but

later wrote the issue of ‘Varnavyavastha’ (casteism).

From the letter it appears that Gandhi had formed a clear view on the issue

on caste system and he was interested in getting it published. In this letter,

Gandhi had explained his position to the recipient and wanted him to get it

published. He asked Kishorelal to examine his views on the said subject

expressed at different times and also acknowledged the suggestions pointed

out by the recipient.

Unlike other letters to family members, this is a typical letter that has got

very little personal aspects. On the other hand, it has got professional touch

with the sender discussing about the work. However the references made in

the letter were exclusive to both and it is safely said that both had a

common area of understanding. Similarly the objective of the issue was to

achieve a social goal. Taken all these into consideration, it is safely said that,

the letter communication fulfils the message centric aspects of interpersonal

communication.

Now we shall move to letters Gandhi had written to freedom fighters.

Here is a letter Gandhi had written to Chhaganlal Joshi in February 16, 1931

(R4). As per his usual style, Gandhi addressed the recipient as ‘Chi’ at the

beginning and then went straight to the issue. He acknowledged of not

being able to write long letters to the recipient for want of time. He then

informed Chhaganlal that he would be coming to a ‘decision’ soon.



147

However there was no mention as to what the decision was all about.

Gandhi then try to boost up the morale of the recipient in continuing the

work he and his other co-workers were engaged in, by citing a stanza from

the ‘Bhagwat Gita’ and explaining it.

From the letter it appears that the co-workers of the recipient were little

unsure about the fate of the movement and this was conveyed to

Gandhi. To this, Gandhi went little philosophical by writing that nothing

is certain in this world except ‘death’ but people went on doing their

duty as if they won’t die. is only certain citied the verse of ‘Gita’ where

lord Krishna asked Arjuna to dedicate himself to him(Krishna) without

caring for anything else. He concluded the letter again with that

philosophical note by writing that ‘our work will end only with our

death, or rather we may say that our work will remain even after our

death.’

Here, though the letter was intended to the addressee, the message was

aimed at a wider audience. The last two lines summed up the message i.e.

‘their work would remain and acknowledged even after their death.’ In

fact, to communicate this component, Gandhi wrote several lines and

quoted the verse of the ‘Gita.’

Gandhi ended his letter with tendering his ‘blessings’ with his signature

‘Bapu’ at the end. He then wrote P.S (for please see) and jotted down his

address at Delhi where he would be staying during his visit there. This is

the pattern he had adopted in several occasion. Now we shall move to a

letter Gandhi had written to Taramati Mathuradas Trikumji (fn3) on

June 14, in 1932 (R5).

Fn3: Taramati Mathuradas Trikumji, was the wife of Mathuradas Trikumji. M KGandhi’s grand nephew. Source: Gandhi., R. (2006). Mohandas: True Story of a Man,His People and an Empire. Penguin, UK.



148

Here also Gandhi addressed the recipient as ‘Chi’ and acknowledged of

receiving her letter. From the letter it appears that, Taramati had

informed Gandhi about the health of her husband Mathuradas. Besides,

she might have enquired about visiting Gandhi’s place to which Gandhi

had responded in his letter.

As Taramati was junior to him, he addressed her as ‘chi’ (for chiranjibi)

and as if to mitigate here concern over Mathuradas’s health, Gandhi

wrote that he was not worried for his lost weight as long as other things

are alright. Here Gandhi also enquired whether Mathuradas had

received his letter or not. This implies that Gandhi had written letters to

both and was keeping a tab on them. Then Gandhi citied the reason for

restriction of visitors to the Ashram and informed the addressee that he

would let her know when the restrictions were removed. At the end,

Gandhi let Taramati know about his and his family’s well-being by

writing that ‘all three of us are well.’ He then signed off the letter by

extending his blessings with his signature ‘Bapu’ at the end.

From the beginning & the end as well as from the body of the letter it is

clear that the communicants were known to each other and had been in

constant touch. Besides, the sender did not name the other two in the

‘all the three of us are well’ implies that the recipient knows them. All

these factors and Gandh’s ‘I shall let you know when the restrictions

were removed’ also signals that the communicants shared good

personal rapport.

Looking this communication in terms of theoretical ‘interpersonal

communication’ perspective, it could be said that this letter justifies all the

preconditions to qualify for this communication.



149

Now we shall move to a letter written to Hemprabha Das Gupta (Fn4) in

January 07, 1933 (R6). The letter in Hindi was written in response to a

letter by the addressee. From the letter it appears that Hemprabha had

sought guidance from Gandhi on the works she was doing to which

Gandhi had responded.

As M K Gandhi was termed as ‘Bapu’ (meaning father or father like

figure) by a large number of people across the country and revered as

such, Gandhi treated them with that affection and authority. Here at

one point of this letter, Gandhi wrote ‘you wish to work for your “Bapu”’

and then added that Bapu will be fully satisfied with Khadi work done.

These two lines provide enough indication about Hemprabha’s reverence

towards Gandhi and Gandhi’s sense of authority over her.

This could be reason that, the current letter, it seems like an advisory

where the sender had advised her as to content with the work or rather

‘duty’ she was doing and also not to keep her foot an all those work that

her ‘Bapu’ was doing. To romp home his point, Gandhi even cited a verse

of the ‘Bhagavad Gita’ which stresses on one’s doing his duty rather than

others work and advised the recipient not to allow greed over powers her

in selecting works. Even as Gandhi had faulted the addressee on her doing

several works at a time and made it clear that he would be happy with the

one work she was good at, he however put the onus to select the course

of action on her. Having wrote strong words and disapproving her way of

working in the first couple of paragraphs, the sender in the last paragraph,

however, tried to give a sense of solace by writing “As you are always-

Fn4: Wife of Satish Chandra Dasgupta and aide of M K Gandhi. Source:http://www.barrackpore.gov.in/HTM/sdobkp_profile.htm



http://www.barrackpore.gov.in/HTM/sdobkp_profile.htm

150

do good, you can never come to grief. God is ever with you. He will never

forsake you.” This may be termed as a balancing act of the sender who,

while writing out his mind, through which he faulted the addressee on

several count, appreciated her ability and wished that God would always

be with her.

Upon analysing, it could be said that, the sender took the liberty in

criticising Hemprabha in such an open manner for the reason that she was

a die-hard follower of the former and considered him as a mentor.

Precisely this could be the same reason that, he appreciated her for her

good works, at the end. If we look at both the ends of letter, it is found

that, at the beginning the sender address the recipient as ‘Chi’ where as he

signed off the letter by extending his blessings, with ‘Bapu’ as his

signature. These signing in and signing out address to the addressee also

justifies the notion we had discussed above.

Moving forward, here is a letter M K Gandhi had written to Mridula

Sarabhai (fn5) in April 26, 1935 (R7). The letter was in Gujarati and the

contents of the letter revolve around the ‘Khadi’ (hand woven cotton

cloth) work.

From the letter, it seems that, Gandhi had written to Mridula on the letter

she had written to Shankarlal Banker (fn6) but was redirected to Gandhi

for his reply. Hence, Gandhi while directly writing to Mridula made it sure

Fn5: Mridula Sarabhai: Indian independent activist and politician. Member ofSarabhai family and sister of Vikram Sarabhai. Source:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mridula_SarabhaiFn6: Shankarlal Banker: One of the first and most loyal recruits of M K Gandhi. Heplayed a major role in textile labour struggle in Ahmadabad along with AnasuyaSarabhai. Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shankarlal_Banker


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mridula_Sarabhai


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shankarlal_Banker

151

that a copy of the letter also reaches Shankarlal so that all the

communicants were in loop. He in fact, asked the addressee to send a

copy to Shankarlal. In the beginning, Gandhi reasoned out for writing the

letter and also for the delay in writing it. He then discussed

the reasons for giving his consent for the use of mill threads on Khadi.

He, being the leading proponent of Khadi, then tried to dissuade the

addressee of continuing the trend by touching upon the sentimental chord

when he wrote “... deep within me I would still wish we could manage

without either.” Gandhi could have asked the recipient to abandon the use

of mill threads. But, he did not do that. Instead, he wrote about his wish

and let the addressee to take a decision. At the end, he wished that the

recipient was doing well and asked her to come to his place when she

could.

At the beginning Gandhi addressed the recipient as ‘Chi’ followed by her

nickname ‘Mridu’ (for Mridula). Similarly as the end, he signed off the

letter by tendering his blessings with his signature as ‘Bapu.’ Besides, the

last sentence ‘come when you can’ gives the impression that she was free

access to the Ashram and could move there as and when she wishes.

From these nuances, it could be inferred that the addressee was junior to

the sender, had a good rapport with him and had free access to the

sender’s Ashram.

Gandhi having had given consent for a work that does not gel well with

his philosophy, he expressed his wish for not following that work but did

not direct her to this effect. This also reflects the personal rapport of both

as the sender was confident that his wish (we may call as the ‘message’)

would be fulfilled. Given the fact that the letter to him was forwarded by



152

Shankarlal, he asked the addressee to give a copy of his letter to

Shankarkal also. This was aimed at keeping all the three in the loop as all

are working with the same objective.

The focus is on studying on the interpersonal aspects and from the letter it

may be said that, the communicants had good communicative relationship

as well as shared the common area of reference i.e. Khadi. The

communication was in their mother tongue i.e. in Gujarati. Besides, the

objective was to achieve the social goal of spreading the Khadi and the

letter reflected and spread the social aspects also.

Now moving to a letter M K Gandhi had written to Indira Nehru (fn7) in

April 05, 1937 (R8). The brief letter was in Hindi and was written the same

day Gandhi wrote a letter to her father. In the letter Gandhi addresses the

recipient as ‘Chi’ followed by her nickname ‘Indu’ (for Indira). This is the

same pattern he had adopted in writing to Mridula Sarabhai. Besides,

Gandhi had referred Indira as ‘Indu’ in his letter to Jawaharlal also.

From the body it appears that, the sender was keeping a tab on the growth

of the recipient and asked her to write about it. He also acknowledged

about her becoming a ‘sevika’ (volunteer) wishes that God grant her long

life and hoped that she would visit him.

In the letter, the sender with limited words, communicated his feeling and

wish towards the addressee and hence might have communicated the

message effectively.. While his keeping a tab on her physical growth

indicated his fatherly like concern for her, his asking her to see him also

Fn7: Indira Nehru, daughter of Jawaharlal Nehru. Source: Nehru., J. (2004), Lettersfrom a father to his daughter. Penguin Books, New Delhi.



153

signifies this desire. It appears that the sender had not seen the addressee

for long and hence wished to see her.

Besides, acknowledging her as a volunteer and wishing long life, he

wanted to impress upon her to work for long with the cause she was

entrusted upon. At the end, the sender extended his blessings with his

signature as ‘Bapu’ at the end. While the initial and singing off address to

the recipient gives enough indication about the personal rapport both the

communicants share, the contents of the letter substantiated this notion.

Here is a letter M K Gandhi wrote to Jawaharlal Nehru (fn8) in August 31,

1938 (R9). In this letter, Gandhi addressed the recipient as ‘My Dear’

followed by his initial ‘Jawaharlal’ where as at the end he extended his

‘Love.’ This is the pattern the sender used to follow in his

correspondences to people very close to him like Henry Soloman Leon

Polak, Hermann Kallenbach, L W Ritch, Millie Graham Polak and

Chhaganlal Gandhi. While Chhaganlal Gandhi was his family member,

others were his close aide and formed a family like bonding with him.

Having had analysing the initial and signing off address to the addressee,

we shall now move to the content of the letter.

The bonding between the communicants was also reflected in the first two

lines of the letter. Here the sender reasoned out as to why he did not write

to the addressee despite his desire to do so. He also showed his concern

towards the addressee’s daughter by writing ‘I await your reply to my wire

about Indu (for Indira Nehru).’

Fn8: Jawaharlal Nehru, a close confident and co-worker of M K Gandhi. He was thefirst Prime Minister of independent India. Source: Source: Nehru., J. (2004), Lettersfrom a father to his daughter. Penguin Books, New Delhi.



154

In the rest of the letter, Gandhi discussed about the political matters

relating to the Congress and the freedom movement. Here also the sender

expressed his solidarity with the recipient on the issue of Jews and asked

him to communicate with them. This also signifies the concurrence of

thought process they both share on vital issues relating to the country and

its people.

Here both the communicants not only shared the communicative

relationship but also had similar thought process of vital issues. Besides,

with the common objective to achieve independence for the country, they

also have the common area of reference as well as social objectives. From

the tone and tenor of the letter it appears that the sender was quite sure

about the recipient’s response on the matters discussed in the latter and

hence completing the communication process.

Now we shall move to a letter M K Gandhi had written to one Dr.

Gopichand Bhargava on July 14, 1939 (R10). The letter was written from

Abotabad to Dr. Bhargava, the then Member of Legislative Assembly of

Punjab at Lahore.

In the beginning Gandhi addressed the recipient as ‘Dear Dr. Gopichand’

and at the end signed out with ‘yours’ followed by ‘Bapu’ at the next line.

In this one line letter Gandhi advised the addressee to work alone to the

best of his capacity. With this the letter ends.

As we analyse this letter, it appears that the letter is formal in nature and

the sender maintained the basic minimum courtesy while addressing the

recipient. Besides, it appears that, Dr. Gopichand had written letter

seeking advice from Gandhi to which he responded by asking him to do



155

the best he could, alone. From this it appears that Dr. Bhargava might

have informed Gandhi that he was all alone taking up the task entrusted

upon him as there was no body to support him. This notion could be

substantiated from the letter Gandhi had written to Dr. Gopichand in

August 30, 1938 (R11). In that letter, Gandhi, referring Dr. Gopichand’s

letter wrote “If the Congress M.L.A.s do not extend any help, it would be

best to get out of the bother. Even as it is, I had not liked your getting

into the Assembly.”

The current letter, it appears, had the edifice which was referred a year

ago. This could be the reason that, Gandhi had asked Dr. Gopichand to

do the best of his capacity, alone.

Here is a letter Gandhi wrote to N R Malkani (fn9) in August 04, 1941

(R12). In this letter Gandhi addressed the recipient as ‘my dear’ with his

surname ‘Malkani’ at the beginning. After going through his numerous

letters, it could be said that very few people, who had formed a very close

bonding with Gandhi, were being addressed as ‘my dear’ by the latter in

his correspondents. This implies that, the addressee must have a close

confident of the sender. This notion also gets a strong footing with the

first line of the letter in which Gandhi mentioned that he had to ‘wait’ for

a long duration to get a letter from Malkani. In the body of the letter,

Gandhi discussed about the work the addressee was doing in villages and

in some occasions--tendered his advice. Besides, he also discussed about

the activities of the Congress and wanted to know whether the recipient

had gone to Quetta to this effect.

Fn9: N R Malkani (1890-1974), a noted social worker and freedom fighter fromRajasthan. Academic by profession, Malkani left teaching and became a close confidentof M K Gandhi. Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/N._R._Malkani


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/N._R._Malkani


156

As the addressee had not mentioned about this in his letter, Gandhi

expressed his eagerness to know the happenings there. By writing this,

Gandhi had effectively asked Malkani to write him a letter detailing the

Congress works.

As it is already evident that the addressee happens to be a close confident

of the sender, the task entrusted upon him must have been important.

This could be the reason that, the sender, by expressing his desire to know

the happenings at Quetta, implicitely asked Malkani to write a letter to

him.

Unlike in his other letters, where Gandhi used to tender his blessings or

love to people close to him, here he just concluded the letter by writing

‘Yours Bapu.’ By doing this Gandhi showed his courtesy and respect

towards the recipient. This could be because the recipient was an academic

who left teaching to work with Gandhi and was undertaking work that

was very close to Gandhi’s heart.

As far as interpersonal communication aspect, this letters fulfils all the

theoretical perspectives. While it establishes the communicative

relationship between the communicants, it is also validating the common

area of reference and the social objectives the communication was aimed

to achieve.

Here is a letter Gandhi had written to Margarete Spiegel (fn10) in March

07, 1942 (R13). In the letter Gandhi addressed here as ‘Chi’ with her

Indian name that was given to her by the sender himself ‘Amala.’ The-

Fn10: Margarete Spiegel: A German follower of M K Gandhi, whom Gandhi renamedas ‘Amala’. Source: Wolpert., S (2001). Return to Rural Uplift Work, Gandhi's Passion:The Life and Legacy of Mahatma Gandhi, p-178. Oxford University Press, New York.



157

letter was in English and the sender reasoned out for writing in English to

‘help her.’ The nuances like addressing a non native Indian as ‘Chi’, giving

her an Indian name and addressing her by that name made it clear that, the

recipient, though a foreigner, had a very strong bonding with Gandhi. This

notion was validated when Gandhi wrote that he was writing the letter in

English to ‘Help her.’ With the information that the addressee was

scheduled to visit his Ashram at Sevagram with her mother and her dog,

Gandhi welcomed her in the ashram but cautioned her about the non

availability of meat for her dog. With this Gandhi ended the letter by

extending his ‘Love’ with his sign as ‘Bapu’ at the end.

Even as Gandhi cautioned Margarete about non availability of meat in the

local market for her dog, Gandhi, added putting a P.S. in the parenthesis

(for please see) and asked the addressee to procure some special kind of

biscuit which was having meant extract, from the city market, so that she

could be free from the problem of feeding the dog during her stay in the

Ashram. At the end, he wished her happiness. Though this paragraph was

added as an afterthought and meant to give some additional information,

Gandhi treated this like a separate letter by addressing again the recipient

as ‘Chi Amala’ and signing out it by writing ‘with Love from’ followed by

his signature as ‘Bapu.’ In a single letter, he addressed the recipient twice

as well as extended his love twice. Besides his signing in and signing out

addresses to Margarete, the whole contents of the letter show Gandhi’s

affinity towards her. Give the fact that the research was on to study the

interpersonal nature of Gandhi’s letter, it could be said that, this letter

signifies that both the communicants not only had communicative

relationship but had a very strong personal bonding and the sender was

very much concerned about the addressee. Hence it could be said that the



158

recipient would act, even if she did not explicitly say so, on the suggestions

made by the sender and thereby completing the communication cycle.

Now we shall move to a letter written to Vinoba Bhave on July 11, 1945

(R14). This letter was in Gujarati implies that both the communicants

share the common mother tongue. As per his usual style, Gandhi address

the recipient as ‘Chi’ followed by the recipient’s initial name ‘Vinoba’ and

at the end of the letter, tendered blessings to him. From the contents of

the letter, it appears that, Gandhi knowing about the release of Vinoba

from a common acquaintance, had written this letter. He first expressed

his wish that Vinoba’s health was doing fine, and then informed him

about a new work that had been readied for him. While naming couple of

other members for the work, Gandhi let Vinoba to take a final call on it.

At the end, he informed him (Vinoba) about his itinerary and ended the

letter by tendering his blessings.

Besides, the initial and final address, other aspects in the letter that could

have a bearing on the psyche of the recipient was the sender’s wishing him

good health and also letting him to decide his future course of action, this

despite the fact that the sender had already readied a task for him. Taking

all these into consideration, it could be said that, though the recipient was

junior to the sender and was treated as such, he also showed his respect

towards the wish of the addressees in the matters of selection of work.

Now we move to a letter written to Sorabji Rustomji (fn11) on or after

March 08, 1946 (R15). The letter was sent to the addressee in South-

Fn11: Sorabji Rustomji, son of Parsee Rustomji, who happened to be the first and fastfriend of Gandhi in South Africa. Rustomjee, a businessmen from India, hadestablished a business in South Africa. Source:Mesthrie., U. D. (2004). Gandhi's Prisoner?: The Life of Gandhi's Son Manilal. OrientLongman Private Limited., Delhi.



159

Africa and the language was Gujarati. In the beginning Gandhi addressed

the recipient as ‘Chi’ with his nickname ‘Sorab.’ Besides, he also concluded

the letter by tendering his blessings. Here, the language of the letter played

a significant role in linking the addressee with his ancestral ‘roots’. Besides,

it might have also helped the sender to express his feelings better, given

the fact that it was his mother tongue. It is already known that the

addressee was the son of Gandhi’s fast & first friend in South Africa.

Besides, at one point Gandhi compared the addressee with his son as

‘blood-brothers.’ This implies that Sorabji was like a son to the sender.

Hence it was but natural that the sender used the initial address and final

blessings suitable to him. The letter is like an advisory where the sender

trying to diffuse an issue between his son and the addressee, made it clear

that he won’t be party to it unless it was not above the board.

He while advising Sorabji to point out Manilal of his mistake also asked

him to introspect and make necessary course correction if any, so that

there was no scope of mistake in matters of public work. At the end he

advised Sorabji to improve his health. This gives an understanding that,

Gandhi might have information about the health of recipient or he had

written this only as a courtesy. In any condition, it suits the occasion.

This letter lets us peep into the ability of Gandhi as to how he, through his

carefully crafted words, try to settle an issue between two people, one his

son and second like a son to him, and both were residing far away from

him, in South Africa, where the sender first started his movement for

equality against the ruling dispensation. While doing this, he also explicitly

made himself aloof from it putting the onus on the addressee.



160

It appears that the nuances like ‘Chi,’ ‘you and he are like blood- brothers,’

‘point out the mistakes of manilal to him,’ ‘do’t involve me in this

business,’ ‘you are a man of bright intellect,’ ‘improve your health’ and

‘blessings’ used by the sender towards the addressees might have set the

stage for communicating the intended message and this is the focal part of

the entire communication.

Now we shall move to a letter Gandhi has written to one Hashmi in

February 04, 1947 (R16). The letter was written in response to a letter by

the addressee.

This is a letter in which Gandhi through addresses the recipient as ‘Bhai’

followed by his name ‘Hashmi’ in the beginning, where as he bluntly

completed his letter without any signing out address. In fact, this is

perhaps one of the rarest letters of Gandhi which did not bear any

courteous word at the end. This is in strong contrast to that of the

Gandhi’s letter writing pattern.

From the letter it appears that Gandhi was disturbed over the factual

incorrect letters written by people graduated from a particular University.

Hence when he received a similar letter from Hashmi, this strong worded

letter was written to him.

The first line sets the tone for the rest of the letter. Gandhi taunted the

addressee for writing in English for the cause of Hindustani and Urdu by

writing “what a thing for you to teach me Hindustani lessons in English!”

Gandhi then pointed out the factual errors he had referred in his letter and

inferred that Hashmi had written the letter in anger and hence did not

ascertain the facts. He also compared Hashmi’s letter to that of letters

from people graduated from Aligarh University. By referring the



161

University, Gandhi in fact put a question mark on the education imparted

by it. He then referred about the facts on the issues referred and abruptly

ended the letter.

At one point Gandhi wrote “you too have written me in anger like those

....” Besides his initial address ‘Bhai’ to the recipient indicates that Hashmi

was known to Gandhi and hence he did not expect such letter from him.

But having had received the letter, he taunted the addressee for adopting

double standard in selection of language and also point out the factual

errors. The non use of courteous words at the end could have been a part

of his strategy to express his displeasure.

Here is a letter Gandhi had written to Ratandevi in November 19, 1947

(R17). The letter is in reply to one from the addressee. From the contents

it appears that the addressee had requested Gandhi to visit their institution

i.e. Vanasthali (Vidyapeeth) and give his blessings, to which Gandhi had

responded.

In this letter Gandhi addressed the recipient as ‘Chi’ in the beginning. He

however did not put any signing out address at the end of the letter.

Besides, in the letter, Gandhi acknowledged of receiving the ‘beautiful’

letter from the addressee and expressed his willingness to visit Vanasthali.

He however reminded her of his view on blessings (fn12) and wrote that

the success of Vanasthali depends entirely on God. From the content it

appears that, Gandhi did not know the addressee. However as her request

Fn12: “When a blessing becomes a curse” that Gandhi wrote on Nov 11, 1947.Through this Gandhi decline to give blessing. Source: The Collected Works ofMahatma Gandhi. Vol.97, P-277. Publication Division, Ministry of Information &Broadcasting, Govt. of India.



162

for an educational institution, Gandhi did not want to hurt her by abruptly

declining her request and hence appreciated her letter by terming it

‘beautiful.’ Besides his expression of desire to visit Vanasthali was also to

mollify the hurt she might felt. And at the end, he put to end to the entire

matter by concluding that success is only at the hand of the God.

Now we shall move to letters Gandhi had written to government officials

during this period. Here is a letter Gandhi had written to Mr. Emerson

(fn13) on July 20, 1931 (R18). This letter was written to the addressee

seeking clarification from him on the government’s stand on ‘Khudai

Khidmatgars (also known as Red Shirts)’ (fn14).

In the beginning Gandhi addressed the recipient as ‘Dear Mr. Emerson’

where as at the end, he signed out by writing ‘yours sincerely.’ From these

addresses and from the contents, it could be termed as a formal official

letter. However there has been stark difference in Gandhi’s approach in

such formal letters if we compare his letter to senior government

functionaries in his earlier years to that of the era we are now

concentrating on. By 1931 Gandhi had become one of the leading

freedom fighter and was directly dealing with the government on various

issues relating to India’s independence. This could have raised his

confidence and was reflected in his letters. Unlike earlier occasion when

Fn13: H W Emerson, home secretary, Govt of India. Source: Interview to the AssociatedPress, The Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi. Vol.53, P-63, Publication Division,Ministry of Information & Broadcasting, Govt. of India.Fn14: Red Shirts: recruits by Khan Abdul Gafar Khan continuing Civil disobediencemovement in the North West Frontier Provinces (NWFP). Source: Note by H. W.Emerson on interview between himself and Gandhiji. The Collected Works of MahatmaGandhi. Vol.52, P-458, Publication Division, Ministry of Information & Broadcasting,Govt. of India.



163

Gandhi used to write very courteously and the tone of his letters was to

request certain information or action, here his letters carry very formal

address and he, if not explicitly but implicitly, seeking the home secretary

to clarify the government’s stand.

Gandhi let Mr. Emerson know the reason for writing this letter and

enclosed a copy of the letter addressed to the provincial police

commissioner by one leader of the ‘Red Shirts.’ He also referred the

summery of the letter written to him by the leader of that movement

detailing police atrocities against the members of ‘Red Shirts.’ Here the

objective of Gandhi could be to make the country’s highest official

responsible for law and order, know the views from the affected people,

which might be in contrary to what the government was claiming. In fact,

Gandhi also referred the home secretary’s information in which he

claimed that Red Shirts are causing endless trouble.From the Collected

Works of Mahatma Gandhi (CWMG) it is evident that Gandhi had several

meetings with the addressee on various issues over a period of time.

Hence, there must have been a formal communicative relationship

between the both. This could have also been the reason that Gandhi wrote

such a formal letter seeking his clarifications. Besi des, he also did not put

his signature at the end.

Now we shall Move to a letter Gandhi had written to E. E. Doyle (fn15)

on November 18, 1932 (R19).As per his usual style of formal letter writing

in the beginning Gandhi addressed the recipient as ‘Dear Col. Doyle’

where as at the end Gandhi signed out by writing ‘yours sincerely’

Fn15: E E Doyle, Inspector-General of Prisons, Bombay Presidency. Source: Letter toE. E. Doyle. The Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi, Vol.55, P-268, PublicationDivision, Ministry of Information & Broadcasting, Govt. of India.



164

with his full name at the end.

The letter was written with a request to provide specialised health care to

one of his close associate, who was suffering from serious illness while

lodged in jail.

Gandhi discussed the health condition & falling weight of Sheth Jamnalal

Bajaj in details and requested the addressee to make necessary

arrangement for his treatment by some specialist doctor. He also

requested for the provision of specialised diet and shifting of Sheth Bajaj

to some other place where he could have access to better medical facility.

Gandhi also made it clear that all he was writing were gathered from the

letters and telegraph of Sheth Bajaj. Besides, suspecting that the

government might not yield to this request citing the cost factor, Gandhi

at the last paragraph wrote that all those costs shall be borne by Sheth

Bajaj.

As one of his close associate was ill and needed immediate specialised

health care, Gandhi in move to impress upon the jail authority, provided

all possible details about the condition of the inmate. He also referred

about the views of a specialist doctor. Besides, he also reminded the

addressee about the telegraph, Sheth Bajaj had sent to him.

There has been a stark contrast in writing style between the letter that was

written to the Jail IG and the letter to the home secretary.. A request was

made in the letter to the Jail IG and hence the letter did not mark any

strong word and it was thoroughly courteous. But, having had information

about government atrocities against people, Gandhi’s letter to the home

secretary did not mark that kind of soft word. Instead, Gandhi bluntly



165

wrote about the inconsistency of facts and implicitly asked for

clarification.

Here is a letter Gandhi had written to the secretary of the Viceroy of India

on Nov 15, 1934 (R20). Like any formal letter to government officials here

also Gandhi maintained the formal courtesy in addressing the recipient. In

sync with his style of addressing people as ‘dear friend’ whom he did not

know personally, here also Gandhi addressed the recipient as ‘dear friend.’

in the beginning. Similarly he signed out the letter by maintaining the basic

courtesy of a formal letter by ‘yours sincerely.’ However given the fact that

the letter was basically intended to the Viceroy, Gandhi put his full name

to complete the ornamental aspect of the letter. He also maintained the

standard British courtesy by addressing ‘His Excellency’ as and when there

was any reference of the Viceroy of India in his letter.

The letter is aimed at the Viceroy of India but was addressed to his

private secretary. The reason might be to maintain the etiquette in no

directly addressing the head of the state on matters that are not required

his direct intervention.

The crux of the letter was that Gandhi had declared to visit the Frontier

Province and meet the people there. However, Given the fact that British

dispensation was troubled with the activities of the ‘Red Shirts’ there (as

was evident from the note by H. W. Emerson, home secretary on

interview between himself and Gandhi (fn16)) the sender wrote this letter

explaining his stand point to ascertain the government’s intention-Fn16: Note by H. W. Emerson on interview between himself and Gandhiji. The CollectedWorks of Mahatma Gandhi. Vol.52, P-458, Publication Division, Ministry ofInformation & Broadcasting, Govt. of India.-over it.



166

From the letter, it appears that Gandhi sensed that the local authority

might not allow him to visit the Frontier Province citing law and order

issue. Hence in his letter, he tried to impression upon the head of the

government by informing him that he won’t be engaging any kind of

activity that put him in direct confrontation with the government.

Making it clear that there was no legal bar against his entering the frontier

province he sought the viceroy’s wish on his proposed visit.

Given the fact that the government was very sensitive on the matters of

Frontier Province, Gandhi did not wish to antagonise the government by

visiting there without keeping them in the loop. On the other hand,

having had declaring publically to visit there, Gandhi, through this letter

tried to impress upon the head of the government to take the visit on right

spirit and not put any bar on it.

This letter reflected the manoeuvrability of Gandhi in dealing a tricky

situation. Having had taken stand on an issue he wrote the letter full with

etiquette and explanations but not without proper justification.

From the reply of the viceroy, we know that the viceroy after consultation

with his officials, advised Gandhi to abandon his plan to visit. The

viceroy, however, had appreciated the consultation Gandhi had made with

him.

Now we shall move to letters Gandhi had written to different people

other than freedom fighters, family members, press or to the government

officials. Those falling in this category include H Harcourt, to a Sikh,

Narayan M. Desai, Gokul Mohan Roy Chauramony, Amtussalaam, Sharda

V. Shah, Khurshedbehn Naoroji, Shyama Prasad Mukherjee, Radha, and

Sarita.



167

First we shall move to a letter Gandhi had written to H Harcourt (fn17)

on Sept. 29, 1931 (R21). Gandhi wrote this letter when he was in London

and the addressee had written a letter to him seeking his appointment.

In line with his standard letter writing style, Gandhi addressed the

recipient as ‘Dear Friend’ implying that the recipient was not known to

Gandhi personally.

In the contents of the letter, Gandhi first thanked the addressee for his

letter and then expressed his inability in giving an early appointment to

him citing his itinerary for the next several days. Nevertheless, Gandhi

fixed an appointment date and time and asked the addressee if he could

meet him on his hotel and added that he shall be delighted to meet him

(Harcourt). He then signed off the letter by writing ‘yours sincerely’ but

did not put any signature.

As the letter was being sent to a person in England, Gandhi maintained

the full British custom by writing the name and address of the recipient

with an ‘esquire’ as a postfix to the recipient’s name.

From the letter it appears that Gandhi despite his busy schedule took

time out to acknowledge Harcourt and also find out a time slot to meet

him. As the time slot was at a later date against the ‘early appointment’

sought by the addressee, Gandhi at the end added ‘I should be delighted

to meet you’ only to express his sincere desire to meet Harcourt. Had he

not written this sentence, the letter would have been just a fact sheet

detailing the schedules of the sender. However, the last line infused ‘life’

to the personalised aspects of the letter and hence made it a piece of

Fn17: H Harcourt, served as a district officer in India and after retirement hadwritten a book on India. Source: Letter to H Harcourt. The Collected Works ofMahatma Gandhi, Vol.53, P-429, Publication Division, Ministry of Information &Broadcasting, Govt. of India.



168

interpersonal communication.

Now we shall move to a letter Gandhi had written to a Sikh (fn18) on

April 28, 1932 (R22). The crux of the letter was that a Sikh had written a

letter comparing Gandhi to that of the founder of Sikh religion Guru

Nanak Dev and requested Gandhi to keep long beard and hair for a saint

like look. To this, Gandhi had responded to the addressee in this letter.

This is perhaps one of the rare letters of Gandhi which did not bear any

signing in or signing out address to the recipient.

From the content it appears that the addressee had not mentioned his

name in his letter and hence, Gandhi did not.

The tone of this letter was rather hard if not harsh.It appears that Gandhi

did not approve of the kind of comparison the recipient had made, and

hence replied in a very blunt manner about what he thought over the issue

and added “I would far rather that people judge me by my deeds than by

my outward appearance.” Through this letter he also expressed his life’s

philosophy.

Here is a letter Gandhi had written to Amtussalaam (fn19) on January

20, 1933 (R23). This letter is one of the rarest in which Gandhi had

addressed the recipient as ‘Dear Daughter.’ The language of letter was

Urdu. In the beginning Gandhi had mentioned about his earlier letter

Fn18: The addressee a Sikh by religion had written to Gandhi “I see not muchdifference between a true saint like Guru Nanak Dev and your noble self. It will bein the fitness of things if the greatest living Indian and the greatest man of thepresent world keep keshas like all the great men of all times.” Source: Letter to A Sikh. The Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi, Vol.55, P-308, Publication Division,Ministry of information & Broadcasting, Govt. of India.Fn19: Amtissalaam, Daughter of Abdul Majid Khan. She was denied educationowning to ‘Purdah’ which she shunned in 1925. She became a social worker anddisciple of Gandhi.Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bibi_Amtus_Salam



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bibi_Amtus_Salam

169

(two days ago) and a telegram to the address. He also enquired about her

health condition and advised her to abide by the instructions he had given.

At the end, he wished her recovery and peace.

From the contents of the letter, it is clear that the addressee was suffering

from some kind of ailment and hence the sender was concerned about her

health. This concern could be gauged from the fact that he had written

two letters and a telegram to her in a span of three days. The initial

address ‘my daughter’ also justifies this fatherly concern. On the other

hand, the instructions and advice he had given to her also reflected the

sense of care a father showed towards his ward.

The letter in ‘Urdu’ reflects that the addressee was comfortable with that

language and the sender knew this. In fact, if we look at the letter Gandhi

had sent to Amtussalaam on January 18, 1933, in the first line Gandhi

wrote ‘I must hurry on to write to you. Therefore, this English letter.’ This

gives enough indication that Gandhi used to write letters to the addressee

in Urdu.

From the initial address, language and contents, it is clear that the

communicants were known to each other and the addressee was like a

daughter to the sender. As we are analyzing the interpersonal

communication aspects of the letters written by Gandhi, it could be said

that this letter reflected the caring & emotional yet instructional aspects of

the sender towards a girl whom he considered as his daughter.

With live relational aspects, this letter fulfils the conditions of

interpersonal communication.



170

Here is a letter Gandhi had written to Shyama Prasad Mukherjee (fn20) on

July 18, 1944 (R24). This letter was written in response to one written by

the addressee eight days ago.

In the beginning Gandhi addressed the recipient as ‘Dear Dr. Shyama

Prasad,’ implying that, he knew the addressee. Had not that been the case,

as it was known from his numerous other letters, he would have addressed

the recipient as ‘Dear Friend.’ Unlike to his writing style, he however

signed out his letter without any courteous word or his signature. This is

the pattern- as evident from his other letters- Gandhi used to adopt, when

he did not approve of the deeds or words of the addressee.

This perception also gets strength from the fact that, in the letter Gandhi

wrote that he had complains on the views expressed by the addressee,

without discussing it. However realising that his (Mukherjee’s) view might

play an important role, he then tried to give an impression that he was

always in the loop when he wrote ‘I suppose it is common cause between

us that the problem should be solved, the earlier, the better.’ At last he

asked Mukherjee to meet him to discuss, if he wished to.

In the beginning, Gandhi maintained the basic courtesy and acknowledged

of receiving the letter from Mukherjee.

Here is another letter Gandhi wrote to one Harshada Diwanji on February

24, 1945 (R25). The gist of the letter was that, the addressee had sent

yarn, cheque of Rs.54 and two letters to Gandhi. Following this, Gandhi

wrote this letter in acknowledgment. The letter was in Gujarati and

Gandhi addressed the recipient as ‘Dear Sister’ at the beginning and-

Fn20: Dr. Shyama Pradad Mukherjee, Working President, Hindu Mahasabha. Source:interview to Shyama Prasad Mookerjee, The Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi, Vol.84,P-271, Publication Division, Ministry of nformation & Broadcasting, Govt. of India.



171

tendered his blessings at the end. From this it could be safely said that

both shared the common mother tongue but she was not known to him.

From the letter it is known that Harshada Diwanji had donated the yarn

and the money to mark the birthday of her husband, who, it appears, is ill,

and hence she had sought blessings from Gandhi. Gandhi wondered

whether he (Mr.Diwanji) was junior to him to be blessed. Nevertheless, he

wrote that he was sending his blessings to him and also wished him long

life.

He also tendered his ‘blessings’ as he signed out with his signature as

‘Bapu’ at the end. This is in stark contrast to his writing style to people not

known to him. Generally in such letters, he used to write ‘yours sincerely’

or ‘yours’ as he signed out with his signature as Bapu or M K Gandhi at

the end. In fact, in some occasions, Gandhi abruptly ended his letters

without writing anything at the end.

But here the deviation could be due to the fact that the addressee had

sought his blessings for her husband which might have moved Gandhi to

tender it to her also.



172

References:

R1: The Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi, Vol. 56, P-371, Publication

Division, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, Govt. of India.

R2: ibid, Vol. 63, P-406, 407

R3: ibid, Vol. 86, P-380, 381

R4: ibid, Vol. 51, P-136, 137

R5: ibid, Vol.55, P-507

R6: ibid, Vol. 58, P-394

R7: ibid, Vol. 67, P-368, 369

R8: ibid, Vol. 71, P-107

R9: ibid, Vol.73, P-425

R10: ibid, Vol.76, P-132

R11: ibid, Vol. 73, P-423

R12: ibid, Vol.80, P-426, 427

R13: ibid, Vol.82, P-101, 102.

R14: ibid, Vol. 87, P-225

R15: ibid, Vol. 90, P-54.

R16: ibid, Vol. 93, P-364

R17: ibid, Vol. 97, P-352

R18: ibid, Vol. 53, P-76

R19: ibid, Vol. 58, P-19

R20: ibid, Vol.65, P-347

R21: ibid, Vol. 53, P-429

R22: ibid, Vol. 55, P-308

R23: ibid, Vol.59, P-67

R24: ibid, Vol. 84, P-204

R25: ibid, Vol. 85, P-419



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