Comprehension Passage - 1

Title: Mahatma Gandhi - The Great Internationalist

"People talk of memorials to him in statues of bronze or marble or pillars and thus they mock him and his message. What tribute shall we pay to him that he would have appreciated? He has shown us the way to live and the way to die and if we have not understood that lesson, it would be better that we raised no memorial to him, for the only fit memorial is to follow reverently in the path he showed us and to do our duty in life and death.

He was a Hindu and an Indian, the greatest in many generations, and he was proud of being a Hindu and an Indian. To him, India was dear, because she had represented throughout the ages certain immutable truths. But though he was intensely religious and came to be called the Father of the Nation which he had liberated, yet no narrow religious or nation bonds confined his spirit. And so he became the great internationalist, believing in the essential unity of man, the underlying unity of all religions, and the needs of humanity, and more specially devoting himself to the service of the poor, the distressed and the oppressed millions everywhere.

His death brought more tributes than have been paid at the passing of any other human being in history. Perhaps what would have pleased him best was the spontaneous tributes that came from the people of Pakistan. On the morrow of the tragedy, all of us forgot for a while the bitterness that had crept in, the estrangement and the conflict of these past months and Gandhiji stood out as the beloved champion and leader of the people of Indian, of Indians it was before the partition cup up this living nation.

What was his great power over the mind and heart of man due to? Even we realize, that his dominating passion was truth. That truth led him to proclaim without ceasing that good ends can never be attained by evil methods, that the end itself is distorted if the method pursued is bad. That truth led him to confess publicly whenever he thought he had made a mistake --- Himalayan errors he called some of his own mistakes. That truth led him to fight evil and untruth wherever he found them, regardless of the consequences. That truth made the service of the poor and the disposed the passion of his life, for where there is inequality and discrimination and suppression there is injustice and evil and untruth. And thus he became the beloved of all those who have suffered from social and political evils, and the great representative of humanity as it should be. Because of that truth in him wherever he sat became a temple and where he trod was hallowed ground."

                                                                                                                        - Jawaharlal Nehru. 

Questions

1. About whom is the passage written?

Answer - This passage is written about the great Mahatma Gandhi.

2. What great lesson did this great man show for life?

Answer -  This great man made us see the way we live and the way we die.

3.  How can we pay him a real tribute?

Answer - We can pay him a real tribute by following the path that he showed us and by doing our duty.

4. Mention why he is called 'the great internationalist'?

Answer - He is called a great internationalist because he was an intensely religious man yet no narrow religious or nation bonds confined his spirit.

5. What did "truth" mean to this great man?

Answer - Truth for him was his dominating passion which led him to fight evil, which led him to suppress the injustice, and which led him to offer service to the poor.

6. What did Mahatma Gandhi refer his mistakes as?

Answer - Mahatma Gandhi often referred his mistakes as Himalayan Errors. 

7. Give the meaning of the following: memorials, immutable, essential, estrangement, spontaneous, discrimination, dominating.

Answer -  1. Memorials  - Something that is built or done to remind of any person or any event.

                2. Immutable - Unchanging over time.

                3. Essential - Completely necessary.

                4. Estrangement - The fact of no longer being on friendly terms.

                5. Spontaneous - Not planned or happening suddenly. 

                6. Discrimination - Treating someone worse than others.

                7.  Dominating - To be more powerful.