This year’s nobel peace prize was awarded to IAEA and Mohamed ElBaradei its General Secretary. Rosa Parks, the pioneer of the american civil rights movement died yesterday.
These two events, unrelated, got me rethinking about a question that had been nagging me for a long time, but had never found the answer to, viz. “Why was Mahatma Gandhi never awarded the Nobel Peace Prize?” When Dalai Lama was awarded the nobel peace prize in 1989, the chairmean of the committee said that it was “in part a tribute to the memory of Mahatma Gandhi”. If there was one person you had to name who personified peace and non-violence in the 20th century, it has to be Mahatma Gandhi. Marthin Luther King Jr., Nelson Mandela, Albert Luthuli all of them considered Gandhi to be their mentor. He was the greatest apostle of peace. Jesus was the first to preach to non-violence. Gandhi was more christian and christians will ever be.
The question resurfaced again, ‘Why was Gandhi not given the nobel peace prize?’. I did some searching, research, digging around and what I came up with surprised me! I am not sure how much of what I say is going to be news to you, but I think its something worth sharing, and so I will.
As a matter of fact Gandhi was nominated for the prize five times, in 1937, 1938, 1939, 1947 and, finally, a few days before he was murdered in January 1948. The Nobel Foundation has recently made public some of the details surrounding Gandhi’s case for a Peace Nobel.
In 1937, Gandhi was nominated for the first time by “Friends of India” association. The committee advisor was, however, exteremly critical of Gandhi. In his evaluate he said…
“He is undoubtedly a good, noble and ascetic person – a prominent man who is deservedly honoured and loved by the masses of India…(But) sharp turns in his policies, which can hardly be satisfactorily explained by his followers. He is a freedom fighter and a dictator, an idealist and a nationalist. He is frequently a Christ, but then, suddenly, an ordinary politician,”
Gandhi was nominated for the next two years but was denied the award each time. The critics blamed Gandhi for the bouts of violence is his non-violent movement for independance (all they wanted as an excuse anyway). And there have been charges of the British government having put pressure on the Norwegian goverenment. Das, in his book ‘Why the Nobel Peace Prize never went to Gandhiji’ says “Britain was highly perturbed when it learned that the doughty naked fakir was being considered for the prize. If he did get it, it would have meant severe political repercussions in Britain’s colonies.” and goes on to say “British government officials silently castigated the European zeal to award the peace prize to Gandhiji and termed their vigorous attempts as an over reaction to Nazism.” Although there is no factual evidence to back this claim, it is still plausible.
The next time Gandhi was nominated was in 1947. With the independance of India and Gandhi’s pivotal role in it, there was no opposition or criticism to his candidature. However, due to the communal riots, the slaughter and lawlessness thanks to the partition and the movement of indian troops in Kashmir (a move condoned by Gandhi) , he committee may have deemed it inappropriate to award the nobel peace prize to anyone in the subcontinent. Interestingly, The Times reported “Mr. Gandhi told his prayer meeting to-night that, though he had always opposed all warfare, if there was no other way of securing justice from Pakistan and if Pakistan persistently refused to see its proved error and continued to minimise it, the Indian Union Government would have to go to war against it. No one wanted war, but he could never advise anyone to put up with injustice. If all Hindus were annihilated for a just cause he would not mind. If there was war, the Hindus in Pakistan could not be fifth columnists. If their loyalty lay not with Pakistan they should leave it. Similarly Muslims whose loyalty was with Pakistan should not stay in the Indian Union.”
The last time he was nominated was in 1948, but Gandhi was assassinated two days before the nominations closed. Nobody had ever been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize posthumously. But according to the statutes of the Nobel Foundation in force at that time, the Nobel Prizes could, under certain circumstances, be awarded posthumously. However, Gandhi did not belong to an organisation, he left no property behind and no will; so the question was ‘Who should receive the prize money?’ After much deliberation On November 18, 1948, the Norwegian Nobel Committee decided to make no award that year on the grounds that “there was no suitable living candidate”.
In my personal opinion, Gandhi was too good for the prize. He never really cared for any accolades anyway. Awarding him the nobel peace prize would devalue his contributions and his impact on humanity. The best we can do is admire him. He will always be beyond our appreciation.
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Hmmm.
After reading your post an amusing thought occured to me. Summarized, ‘Lagaan’: Oscars :: Gandhi : Nobel Prize.
If some nakki, 2-bit congress party member raised hue & cry over this issue, it’d would get unwanted media buzz. Just like that crap movie ‘Lagaan’ which was definitely not worth the film it was shot on. It would be definitely embarassing.
Forgot to tell you the other day, (busy running my mouth you know
;-0} that I like the new look!!
And hey, you linked me!! Wow, what an honor!! Thank you, I just hope I don’t disappoint you!
I am linking this one….
Vinay
Unfortunately, people who deserve the prize often don’t get it. One thought to consider though, how do you think Ghandi would feel about getting the “Peace Prize” set up by Alfred Nobel because he felt guilty for having developed Dynamite which turned out to be so effective as a weapon?
hey me was tryin 2 figure out who u were:).. now me know ;)!…yeah tht ‘was’ my blog… n yes sangeetha we shall find… ! :D
Was just visiting and wanted to pop in and say hi, so HI! ;-0}
Take care.
I loved the new template.. awesome..
Interesting read this..
Long time since I came here :)
And now it looks like, you havent been here for long too..
The irony – is overwhelming! :D
Good thought. I had never thought about this before.
BTW, Nice template you have got. The header looks awesome.
Well.. I came here after a long time, and what do I see, a thought provoking post. :)
First of all, I don’t think Hitchcock didn’t win any oscar, nor did Scorsese. There are others in the list I guess. And Saif Ali Khan got the award for the best actor in Hum Tum. :). Not that there are any links between any of these, just random thoughts I had in mind.
But Stormcrowes comment had me thinking. I am sure the father of the nation is feeling guilty already for a lot of reasons, some of them below. :)
# The majority of the people do not obey the law, starting from the simplest like traffic rules. We have never been told to get out of the “non-cooperation” since the government is now run by our people.
# Harthals and Bundhs are being used for everything other than people’s welfare.
There are more, but don’t have the time and inclination to put. :)
Most people have pretty extreme opinions on Gandhi in India, as far as I have seen. Some worship him, some despise him. Its still a controversial topic. I guess it must be a huge thing to say for a man that even so many years after his death, both factions still feel so strongly about him and argue so violently on the topic
It’s pathetic that Mahatma Gandhi who actually defined the words Nonviolence and Peace, has not given Noble prize for peace.
Well in conclusion It can be said,
1) Gandhi is too big for any such prize.
2) Its unfortunate for ‘Nobel Peace Prize’ that it failed to associate it self with Gandhi.
Hi, I doubt if Gandhi would have accepted the prize anyway.
There is a bigger issue to confront here. Forget the Nobel Prize recognizing what Gandhi did, most of the people in India are actually anti-Gnadhi and claim that if there would have been an arms struggle , we would have got independence faster. I have argued endlessly about this with these kind of people, but to no use. What Einstein said will become true, “200 years later people will not believe that there existed a man like Mahatma Gandhi”
PS- I am your brother’s friend, got here form his blog, first time I have read your post, great going.
@Mahesh
It is not true that most ppl in India are anti-Gandhi.There is a difference of opinion but nevertheless Gandhi is respected by everyone for what he did for the nation.
S.Manohar