If Mahatma Gandhi had been alive today, he would have been very happy to see the British Prime Minister spinning a Charkha in his ashram.
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who is on a visit to India, today performed a Charkha at Sabarmati Ashram in Gujarat and paid tributes to Mahatma Gandhi. Boris Johnson is the Prime Minister of the same country that ruled India for nearly 200 years and the Sabarmati Ashram in which he took a lot of pictures today used to be the centre of revolt against the British government during the independence movement.
Boris Johnson is the first British Prime Minister to visit Mahatma Gandhi's Sabarmati Ashram during his visit to India. Apart from this, he has also become the first Prime Minister of Britain to visit Gujarat after the independence of India in the year 1947. Mahatma Gandhi was also a Gujarati and was born in Porbandar, Gujarat. This event is also historic and there is a great lesson hidden in it for Britain.
Boris Johnson also wrote a special message for Mahatma Gandhi in Sabarmati Ashram's visitors book today.
He wrote that that it is a privilege for him to come to the ashram of an extraordinary man like Mahatma Gandhi. And he came here and understood how Gandhiji used the simple principles of truth and non-violence to make the world better.
Apart from this, he also made a tweet garlanding the statue of Mahatma Gandhi, in which he wrote that he is also feeling overwhelmed by visiting the Sabarmati Ashram like everyone else. At this time when there is tension in the world, Gandhiji's thoughts on peace can change the course of history.
Boris Johnson is the prime minister of the same Britain, who once hated Mahatma Gandhi and his Charkha a lot. Former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill once referred to Gandhi as the ‘Half Naked Fakir’.
In fact, Winston Churchill was blowing the hackles of Gandhiji and his Charkha by saying so. In addition, Winston Churchill compared Indians to animals in 1943. At that time there was a famine in united Bengal and Winston Churchill was saying that any help for India would be insufficient because Indians produce children like rabbits. But Boris Johnson is feeling lucky and blessed to be in this India today.
It is the cycle of time, showing Britain its true character. Today, the Charkha with which Boris Johnson posed for a photograph at the Sabarmati Ashram is the same that was hated by the British government during the freedom movement.
By the way, the story of this charkha begins with the Sabarmati Ashram in Gujarat. After returning to India from South Africa, Mahatma Gandhi founded his first ashram on 25 May 1915. And this ashram was in Kochrab in Ahmedabad. And this ashram was also not very large in area, due to which Mahatma Gandhi was not able to do animal husbandry and farming there.
After this, on 17 June 1917, he shifted this ashram to a large place on the banks of the Sabarmati River. It is also known today as Sabarmati Ashram or Gandhi Ashram. Mahatma Gandhi lived in this ashram from 1927 to 1930 and during this time he started many major agitations and hunger strikes from this ashram.
Among them, the Non-Cooperation Movement, which began in the 1920s, was very important, in which Mahatma Gandhi was encouraging the people of the country to give up foreign goods and adopt indigenous goods. And they were giving a message to the people to shave yarn by running a Charkha in their houses. That is, the Sabarmati Ashram, which used to be the centre of the revolt against the British government, today Boris Johnson went to the same place and took these magnificent pictures and also wrote good things about Mahatma Gandhi.
Whereas before independence, Mahatma Gandhi wanted the people of India to give up foreign clothes and prepare clothes for themselves. And this appeal had a profound impact on the people of India. At that time most of the farmers of India were inspired to run the Charkha. And this Charkha became a weapon more powerful than a bomb against the British. After this, Mahatma Gandhi never allowed the importance of the Charkha to diminish among the people of India.
However, in protest against the atrocities committed by the English government on the people of India due to this Charkha, Mahatma Gandhi had also left the Sabarmati Ashram. In fact, Mahatma Gandhi started the Dandi March from this ashram in 1930 to break the salt law of the British. And during this movement, the British Government had arrested 60,000 freedom fighters and put them in jail and confiscated their property. In protest, Mahatma Gandhi then said that the English government could also seize his Sabarmati Ashram.
And then in 1933, he announced that he would not return to this ashram until India got freedom. Mahatma Gandhi was assassinated a year after independence and due to this, he was never able to return to the Sabarmati Ashram after 1933. However, if Mahatma Gandhi had been alive today, he would have been very happy to see the British Prime Minister running a Charkha like this in his ashram.
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 "DNA Special: The significance of a British PM spinning Mahatma Gandhi’s Charkha")
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