Thread by @maheshperi

On this day, it is important to remember Mahatma Gandhi, a man much maligned now as RSS which never had a role in our freedom struggle tries to appropriate the badge of patriotism. Here are some remarkable facts that makes Gandhi Ji a Mahatma:

1. Gandhiji was jailed eleven times. In all, he spent 11 years and 19 days in jail. Once he was arrested for sedition, a colonial rule implemented by British against freedom fighters but used in a free India by current day governments too.

2. Gandhiji, in all fasted 17 times as his way of protest. He fasted for 21 days at a stretch three times - one for Hindu/Muslim Unity, another to protest untouchability and third time to protest his detention without charges.

3. In all, 79,000 km is the estimated distance that Gandhiji walked during his campaigns from 1914 to 1948. This is equivalent to circling the Earth twice. Gandhiji walked 18 kms a day for nearly 40 years.

4. Gandhi Ji wore just a loin cloth for 27 years. He gave up his normal wardrobe in Sep 1921 in Madurai after he decided that he has to work for and with the with the poor people of India and has to be identified with them. He stuck to this dress code even on his trip abroad.

5. In 1930, Gandhiji was the Time Magazine's Man of the Year, the only Indian till date. The editorial read "it was in a jail that the year's end found the little half-naked brown man whose 1930 mark on world history will undoubtedly loom largest of all."

6. Gandhi wrote a lot of articles and essays. He founded 3 newspapers and wrote 3 books of his own. The Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi have 50,000 pages!

7. His book, ' My Experiments with Truth' sold about 60 lac copies till date. The sale in English was 20.98 lac copies. The Malayalam edition published in 1997 sold 8.24 lac copies.

8. He was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize five times but never won. In 1948, he was nominated but assassinated much before the announcement. The Nobel prize of 1948 wasn't given to anyone. The Nobel committee publicly regretted not conferring the award on Gandhi.

9.It is the poet Rabindranath Tagore, who gave the title Mahatma to Gandhiji. His resilience, steely resolve, determination, non-violent ways to protest, struggle, suffering and still a desire to do good can never be found in another.

10. Even today, when any leader, Including Narendra Modi, visits any foreign land, espouse the teachings of Gandhiji to get any credibility or recognition.

Try a million times, but for India, there is only one Mahatma and One 'Father of the Nation. MAHATMA GANDHI.

End.