Still reading GANDHI

“Its not just his enigmatic persona that captured the imagination of millions,and inspired a few of them to write about him,but something beyond that. Everything that he touched became a symbol,and in fact in many places around the world still continues to be so,” explains Charles Matthews,manager at Manneys Bookstores in Camp. “The very fact that even now his autobiography is published by a host of publishers goes to show how popular his ideologies still are. In addition to that,there are some interesting books like Gandhi and Churchill by Arthur Herman,Notes from Gandhigram by Samir Banerjee and Rethinking Gandhi and Non-Violent Relationality that deal with various facets of his life,” he adds.

Some other noteworthy reads relating to Mahatma Gandhi include,Gandhi’s Khadi by Rahul Ramagundam,that deals with the evolution of the Khadi cloth from its simple status as a common man’s commodity to the symbol of political freedom for a nation,and also The Philosophy of Mahatma Gandhi for the 21 st Century that deals with his ideologies about concepts like globalisation modernisation,regionalism and fundamentalism.

Speaking about books written on Gandhiji Balbir Singh,book section in charge at Landmark says,“A very important trend that has been observed as far as books written on Mahatma Gandhi are concerned is the fact that college students and foreigners are amongst the highest number of readers of his books. Also,some other books written on him include Gandhi-A Political and Spiritual Life by Kathryn Tidrick,which deals with the spiritual ideologies of his life,and also Mohandas by Rajmohan Gandhi,which are offbeat books that deal with the beliefs of Mahatma Gandhi and how they helped in shaping modern India.”

And while most assume that the Mahatma’s teachings are a little alien for a fast changing world which doesn’t have time to delve in these ideas of truth and non-violence,Rohit Shenoy a software engineer has a different take,“I recently purchased- Phaidon by Peter Ruhe,which is a photo book that deals with the freedom struggle,Gandhi’s friends,various incidents that altered the course of freedom movement as seen through the eyes of photographers and also Gandhiji himself. Every picture tells a different story about him,and reveals a new side of his,” he says.