Mahatma Gandhi

CTL-E-5348 · Person · activist · 1869–1948

VERIFIED evidence grade of this record

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (October 2, 1869, Porbandar, India — January 30, 1948, Delhi) was an Indian lawyer and activist who led India's independence movement against British rule through satyagraha, his doctrine of nonviolent resistance, and was assassinated in 1948, months after independence. Trained in law in London, he spent about two decades in South Africa organizing against racial discrimination before returning to India in 1915, later leading campaigns including the 1930 Salt March. Gandhi enters this Black cultural knowledge graph for a documented reason, not decoration: in February 1936 he met Howard Thurman and the visiting African American delegation in India, and Thurman carried Gandhi's nonviolence back into Black Christian thought, mentoring Martin Luther King Jr. King also studied Gandhi directly and called his method the only morally and practically sound method open to oppressed people, in the United States Senate's later summary of his words. The lineage Gandhi to Thurman to King is the record's center of gravity.

The record

• Also known as: Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, Mohandas K. Gandhi, Mahatma

Notes

Statistics: Born October 2, 1869, Porbandar; died January 30, 1948, Delhi, aged 78 (Britannica) · Thurman delegation's meeting with Gandhi dated February 21, 1936 in the Harijan-published interview account (mkgandhi.org); the delegation's Pilgrimage of Friendship began in 1935 (Beacon Press) — sources differ on framing the journey as 1935 vs. the meeting as 1936, and both dates are stated here rather than blended · Salt March, 1930 (Britannica) · India independent August 15, 1947 (Britannica) · Curator's Judgment: DRAFT — for founder review: This is a tribute record with a narrow, honest brief: Gandhi is here because Thurman sat with him in 1936 and King built a movement on what traveled back. CTL should resist both hagiography and erasure — the transmission line is documented, and it is enough. · Photo slot: CLEARED CANDIDATE — Wikimedia Commons File:Mahatma-Gandhi, studio, 1931.jpg, Elliott & Fry, Public domain, license verified from Commons API metadata on 2026-10-15; direct URL https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7a/Mahatma-Gandhi%2C_studio%2C_1931.jpg; not downloaded — visual pass follows merge per standing pattern.

Relationships

• Martin Luther King Jr. — related to
  King's nonviolence drew directly on Gandhi through two documented channels: Howard Thurman met Gandhi in India (interview dated February 21, 1936) after his delegation's 1935 Pilgrimage of Friendship, carried satyagraha into Black Christian thought, and mentored King at Boston University; King also studied Gandhi directly, and the U.S. Senate resolution summarizes King calling Gandhi's method the only morally and practically sound method open to oppressed people.

Sources

• Encyclopaedia Britannica, "Mahatma Gandhi" — https://www.britannica.com/biography/Mahatma-Gandhi
• Congress.gov / Library of Congress, "S.Res.357 — Celebrating the 150th anniversary of the birth of Mahatma Gandhi" — https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-resolution/357/text
• Beacon Broadside (Beacon Press), "When Howard Thurman Met Mahatma Gandhi: Nonviolence and the Civil Rights Movement" — https://beaconbroadside.com/2014/10/02/when-howard-thurman-met-mahatma-gandhi-nonviolence-and-the-civil-rights-movement/
• GandhiServe / mkgandhi.org, "Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr." — https://www.mkgandhi.org/articles/Mahatma-Gandhi-and-Martin-Luther-King-Jr.html

Record CTL-E-5348 · CultureTechLens Knowledge Graph · evidence grade: VERIFIED · 4 sources · 1 mapped relationship · CTL research: PPL-001.
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