Gopal Krishna Gokhale

Topic: The National Movement: Gandhian Era · NCERT: Class 12, Ch 3 "Mahatma Gandhi and the Nationalist Movement"

Meaning

Gopal Krishna Gokhale (1866–1915) was a leader of the Moderates in the Indian National Congress. The Moderates wanted to win reforms through steady, lawful pressure. He founded the Servants of India Society in 1905 [2], and Gandhi honoured him as his political guru (a teacher who guides a person in public life) [2].

He matters because he connects two eras. He shaped the man who went on to lead the Gandhian mass movement. His advice to "first travel, then speak" decided how Gandhi began his work in India in 1915.

Explanation

Background: the Congress Gokhale belonged to

• The Swadeshi movement (1905–07) made the Congress bigger. Before it, the Congress was a small yearly meeting of educated Indians. After it, more people joined and their demands became sharper.
• Two camps grew inside the Congress:
• The militants, known as "Lal, Bal and Pal" (Lala Lajpat Rai, Bal Gangadhar Tilak and Bipin Chandra Pal). They wanted direct, aggressive action.

• The Moderates, including Gokhale and Muhammad Ali Jinnah. They wanted steady, lawful pressure on the government.

• Gokhale was one of the leading Moderates of this period.

The Servants of India Society, 1905

• Gokhale founded the Servants of India Society in 1905. [2]
• Its aim: to bring together and train Indians of different communities and religions for welfare work, meaning service that improves people's lives. [2]
• What made it different:
• It trained people to serve the public, so it was more than a debating club.

• It brought members of different faiths together in one body. Gandhi also cared deeply about unity between faiths.

• After Gokhale died in 1915, Srinivasa Sastri became the Society's president. [2]

Gokhale and Gandhi: the guru and the disciple

• Gandhi came back from South Africa in January 1915. He already knew satyagraha ("devotion to truth"), a way of fighting a wrong without violence by accepting suffering yourself.
• Gandhi revered Gokhale as his political guru. [2]
• Gokhale's advice: first travel, then speak.
• Gandhi spent a whole year travelling around India before he took any political stand.

• The point was simple. He had to know the country before he could lead it.

• Gokhale died in 1915, the same year Gandhi returned and joined the Congress. [2] So he did not live to see Gandhi's movements in India.

Results: what Gandhi took and what he left

• What he took (method):
• Study before acting: the year of travel.

• The service model of the Servants of India Society. [2]

• What he left (limits):

• The Moderate habit of only sending petitions (written requests) to the government.

• The result: a third path. It was not Moderate petitioning and it was not militant violence. It became mass, non-violent satyagraha.

• The year of travel led on to the BHU speech (February 1916), where Gandhi said "our salvation can only come through the farmer". It then led to Champaran (1917).

Time, place and evidence

• Period: late colonial India, the Swadeshi years (1905–07) up to Gandhi's return in 1915. This is the start of the Gandhian era (1915–1948).
• Life span: 1866–1915.
• Key dates: Servants of India Society founded in 1905 [2]; Gokhale died in 1915 [2]; Gandhi returned in January 1915 and spent the next year travelling India.
• Key people:
• Gandhi, his disciple.
• Srinivasa Sastri, his successor as president of the Society. [2]
• Jinnah, a fellow Moderate.

• Lal, Bal and Pal, the militant camp he stood against.

• How we know:

• Gandhi's own statements that Gokhale was his political guru. [2]
• Reference accounts of the Servants of India Society. [2]
• The NCERT Class 12 chapter "Mahatma Gandhi and the Nationalist Movement", which places Gokhale's advice and Gandhi's year of travel at the start of Gandhi's Indian career. [3]

Don't confuse with

• Bal Gangadhar Tilak: the "Bal" of Lal, Bal and Pal, from the militant camp. Gokhale was a Moderate. Gandhi called Gokhale, not Tilak, his political guru.
• Natal Indian Congress (1894): founded by Gandhi in South Africa to unite Indians there. The Servants of India Society (1905) was founded by Gokhale in India.
• Srinivasa Sastri: he succeeded Gokhale as president of the Servants of India Society in 1915. [2] He was not its founder.
• Muhammad Ali Jinnah: in the Swadeshi years he was also in the Moderate camp, alongside Gokhale. Do not place him among the militants just because of what he did later.

Prelims Hooks

• Gokhale (1866–1915) was Gandhi's political guru. [2]
• Servants of India Society: founded by Gokhale in 1905 to train Indians of all communities for welfare work. [2]
• Srinivasa Sastri succeeded Gokhale as president of the Society in 1915. [2]
• Trap: Gokhale died in 1915, the year Gandhi returned [2]. So Gokhale could not have guided Champaran (1917) or Kheda (1918).
• Camps: Moderates = Gokhale, Jinnah; militants = Lal, Bal and Pal.
• Chronology: Servants of India Society (1905) → Gandhi returns (Jan 1915) → a year of travel on Gokhale's advice → BHU speech (Feb 1916) → Champaran (1917).

Mains Points

• Gokhale's influence was about method, not ideology.
• Gandhi took the Moderate discipline of study before action (the year of travel) and the service model of the Servants of India Society. [2]
• He dropped the Moderate habit of only petitioning the government.

• The result was mass, non-violent satyagraha, a path that was neither Moderate nor militant.

• Continuity across the Moderate–Gandhian break.

• The usual story is that "mass" nationalism replaced "elite" nationalism.
• But two Gandhian ideas already existed in Gokhale's work: training volunteers for service, and bringing communities of all religions together.

• Use this to show continuity as well as change in GS-I answers.

• Know the country first, then lead it.

• Gokhale's advice gave Gandhi a year to see India's poor for himself.
• That experience fed the BHU speech, where he said nationalism so far had been made by lawyers, doctors and landowners [3], and it led on to Champaran.
• So the mentor's advice helped turn the Congress towards the masses.

Related concepts

• Mahatma Gandhi
• Gandhi in South Africa
• Natal Indian Congress
• Indian Opinion
• Phoenix Settlement
• Tolstoy Farm
• Indian National Congress
• Moderates
• Extremists
• Lal Bal Pal

Read more

• Gandhi's arrival: South Africa, the India of 1915, the BHU announcement