MADURAI: Hundred years ago, on September 22, Mahatma Gandhi made the epoch-making decision to switch from elaborate Gujarati outfits to a simple dhoti and shawl. This decision made by Gandhi in Madurai not only became a part of history but also his very identity.
"All the alterations I have made in my course of life have been effected by momentous occasions; and they have been made after such a deep deliberation that I have hardly had to regret them. And I did them, as I could not help doing them. Such a radical alteration - in my dress - I effected in Madurai," wrote Gandhi on his change to loincloth.
It was a time when Gandhi was intensely boycotting foreign clothes. His alternative for foreign clothes was hand-weaved Khadi. However, on his trip to Madurai from Madras (now Chennai) in 1921, he was exposed to the 'naked' truth.
"We are too poor to buy Khadi," said the peasants in the third-class train compartment that Gandhi happened to travel on that day. "I realised the substratum of truth behind the remark... The millions of compulsorily naked men, save for their langoti four inches wide and nearly as many feet long, gave through their limbs the naked truth," wrote Gandhi.
On reaching Madurai, he stayed in the house of his follower Ram Kalyanji in Mela Masi Street (Door No. 251 A). Giving up his Gujarati outfit, he adopted his new attire on September 22, 1921. Remarkably, the place where he appeared first in public in his loincloth attire is now called 'Gandhi Pottal'. A statue of Gandhi stands there just across Alankar Theatre on Kamarajar Road. With September 22 marking 100 years of this historical incident, Madurai is getting ready for the centenary celebrations.
Vice-Chairperson of Gandhi Memorial Museum, M Manickam, told The New Indian Express, "Gandhi wanted to be one among the peasants. Notably, he chose the dress code of a South Indian farmer and not a North Indian one. It shows how a leader should join the masses he wants to represent."
Further elaborating on the events planned for the centenary celebrations, the committee members of the museum said foundation stone will be laid for Rs 6-crore-worth modernisation and refurbishment of the museum.
A centenary commemorative volume on 'Democracy and Development' is also to be released. While Chief Minister MK Stalin is likely to participate, granddaughter of Gandhi, Tara Gandhi Bhatacharjee, has agreed to take part in the event, they said.
'Half-naked fakir'
The change in attire not only brought him bouquets but also brickbats. Winston Churchill famously ridiculed Gandhi as a 'half-naked fakir'.