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VIRCHAND R. GANDHI
39 - Virchand R. Gandhi
A Brief Summary of His Life and Mission
(August 25, 1864 to August 7, 1901)
It was the memorable day of September 11, 1893. The Columbus Hall of the Art Institute of Chicago was overflowing with over 3, 000 delegates of different nations and religions. It was the opening day of the Parliament of World Religions Conference, the first such conference ever organized in the history of mankind. The aim of the conference was to impart the knowledge of different religions to the world, to promote a feeling of fraternity between followers of diverse religious persuasions, and to pave the way for world peace. The conference lasted for 17 days. Two young men among them, with their Indian costumes and turbans, drew special attention from the public. One was the world famous Swami Vivekananda, who represented Hinduism, and the other was Shri Virchand Raghavji Gandhi, who represented Jainism. They made such an impact at the Parliament of Religions with their impressive speeches and personality that, they both were requested to prolong their stay in the U.S. and continue giving speeches in different cities after the conference was over. Shri Virchand Gandhi, a young man of twenty-nine, impressed the delegates not only by his eloquence, but also by the sheer weight of his scholarship. The impartiality of his outlook and his oratorical skills fascinated the delegates at the conference. An American newspaper wrote, "Of all the Eastern scholars, it was this youth whose lectures on Jain faith and conduct were listened to with great interest and attention." Shri Virchand R. Gandhi was born on August 25, 1864 in Mahuvä, near Bhavnagar, Gujarat. After his primary and secondary education in Bhavnagar, he joined Elphinstone College in Mumbai. He graduated and obtained a B.A. Degree with honors from the University of Bombay in 1884. He was probably the first graduate amongst the Jains at that time. He was also a student of Buddhism, Vedanta Philosophy, Yoga, Christianity and Western philosophy. He had also done a comparative study of various philosophies, which equipped him for talks on various subjects with confidence. He had command over fourteen languages including Gujarati, Hindi, Bengali, English, Präkrit, Sanskrit, and French.
Shri Gandhi became the first honorary secretary of the Jain Association of India in 1885 at the age of 21. As secretary, he worked very hard for the abolition of the poll tax levied on pilgrims to Mount Shatrunjay, the most sacred place of Jain religion at Pälitänä. To protest against the ruler in those days was to invite severe punishment and even death. He prepared a case to compromise. He made a strong representation to Lord Ray, the governor of Bombay, and Colonel Watson, the political agent, and eventually the poll tax was abolished in place of a fixed payment of Rs. 15,000 per year to the ruler for looking after the safety of the pilgrims and the holy place. In 1891 Mr. Bodam, an Englishman, set up a factory for slaughtering pigs and making tallow out of them at Sametshikhar, another holy place of Jain pilgrimage near Calcutta in the state of Bihar. Shri Virchand Gandhi went all the way to Calcutta to stop the killing of pigs at the holy place. He stayed there for six months, learned Bengali, prepared his case against the factory, and ultimately got this verdict issued: "Sametshikhar is a place of Jain pilgrimage, and nobody else has any right to interfere there." He got the factory to close down. Shri Virchand Gandhi was a great social reformer at a very young age. At the age of 22, he wrote long essays to remove evil social customs and continuously fought against them and was successful in eradicating many of them. Shri Virchand Gandhi sailed to the U.S. along with Swami Vivekananda to attend the Parliament of World Religion Conference in 1893. He stayed in the United States for about two years after the conference and gave lectures in cities such as Chicago, Boston, New York, and Washington. He also visited England, France, Germany, and other places in Europe. In foreign countries, he wore a long and loose kurta, a white shawl on his shoulder, a golden bordered kathiäwädi turban on his head, and country shoes. This external appearance bore the imprint of India. He delivered more than 535 lectures on Jainism, yoga, Indian systems of philosophy, Indian culture, occultism, and spiritualism. He qualified as a barrister in London at one of the Inns of the court, but did not use this qualification for monetary gain.
JAIN STORY BOOK
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