Remarkable Ghandhi book

Hind Swaraj is M.K.Gandhi's remarkable book written originally in Gujarati in ten days in November 1909 on a ship from London to Durban. This is the only book that the Mahatma himself translated into English.

Even his famous autobiography, My Experiments with Truth, was first translated into English by his secretary, Pyare Lal. It was written weekly in a serial format for his magazine, Indian Opinion.

The English version of Hindi Swaraj was published in 1910 - this year marks the centenary celebration of this most radical and revolutionary document of the time.

The British Raj banned it; the Indian nationalists condemned it. They perceived it as Gandhi's reactionary thinking against Indians' fight for freedom by any means and the modernization of Mother India on European structures of industrialization.

Few books have been more misread, misinterpreted and misunderstood by a writer's contemporaries. One critic writer described it as an 'incendiary manifesto.'

full report here Fiji Times