A South African hiatus
November 19, 2024
In hindsight, we know that Mohandas Gandhi went to South Africa in 1893 and spent two decades there. When I summed up his time on the African continent, I wrote:
There had been many transformational experiences…. Two of his sons were born there, he received his first jail sentence, the tactic of satyagraha was developed, he founded intentional communities, began experimenting with extended fasting, and he took a vow of celibacy. As Nelson Mandela observed of Gandhi’s time in South Africa, “You gave us Mohandas Gandhi; we returned him to you as Mahatma Gandhi.”
But in 1901, before any of these things had happened, Gandhi left.
He said his goodbyes to the Indian community (there was some family drama over the parting gifts he received), packed up his family and moved back to India. Adios, South Africa.
Biographer Ramachandra Guha has speculated on Gandhi’s motivation for giving up his successful law practice in South Africa. His family certainly played a role; his wife Kasturba was largely isolated in this foreign country. Their four boys were going to need an education: Harilal, the oldest, was a teenager now, and “there was no suitable school for him or his brothers in Durban.”1 And another Indian lawyer had established a practice there, so his community would still have legal representation.
Their voyage stopped for a few days on the island of Mauritius. The British colony had an Indian population familiar with Gandhi’s work in South Africa; a party was arranged in his honor. On November 19, 1901, the family left the island and arrived in India the following week.
To start, they moved back into the family home in Rajkot. Harilal went to a boarding school, and Gandhi started a law practice. Or, he tried. After seven months with very little progress in Rajkot, he opened an office in Mumbai, across the street from where the High Court met, and attempted to attract clients there. After three months of floundering, a telegram arrived from South Africa, asking him to return promptly and enclosing funds for him to do so.
A few months earlier, the Boer War had concluded: the republics of the Orange Free State and Transvaal were now British colonies. As a result, Joseph Chamberlain, His Majesty’s Principal Secretary of State for the Colonies, was planning a visit to South Africa to see the new territory. This was a rare opportunity for British Indians to directly petition a representative from London about their grievences. Would Gandhi take the job?
Establishing a law practice in India was an experiment worth trying (again), but the message from South Africa had more promise, just like in 1893. Closing down his unsuccessful Mumbai office, Gandhi said goodbye to his family, and with two of his nephews, made arrangements to sail back to South Africa on November 19, 1902.
What’s a venture that you tried, but didn’t work?
Gandhi Before India (Ramachandra Guha, 2014) p. 142