Volume II,Issue IV, March 2026
Volume-II, Issue-IV, March, 2026 |
Received: 20.03.2026 | Accepted: 21.03.2026 | ||
Published Online: 31.03.2026 | Page No: | ||
DOI: 10.69655/atmadeep.vol.2.issue.04W. | |||
গান্ধীর
নন্দনতত্ত্ব: একটি দার্শনিক বিশ্লেষণ
শুভঙ্কর পোদ্দার, গবেষক, উত্তরবঙ্গ
বিশ্ববিদ্যালয়, পশ্চিমবঙ্গ, ভারত |
Gandhi’s Aesthetics: A Philosophical Analysis Subhankar Poddar, Research Scholar, University of North Bengal, West Bengal, India | ||
ABSTRACT | ||
This paper examines Mahatma Gandhi's philosophy of art and aesthetics. Although Gandhi is primarily known as a political thinker, his writings reveal a consistent and original aesthetic theory. Against the dominant Western tradition that treats art as autonomous and separable from moral life, Gandhi argued that art, labour, and ethics are inseparable. For Gandhi, beauty is not an independent quality to be appreciated in isolation— it is the natural outcome of honest, ethical, and purposeful human activity. The paper traces the philosophical sources of Gandhi's aesthetics, including the influence of Tolstoy and Ruskin from the Western tradition, and the Upanishads, the Bhagavad Gita, and Jain philosophy from the Indian tradition. It then analyses the central pillars of his aesthetic thought: his rejection of 'art for art's sake,' his elevation of hand labour as a form of creative expression, his critique of industrialism in 'Hind Swaraj,' and his use of the charkha as both a philosophical symbol and an aesthetic ideal. The paper also considers satyagraha as a lived aesthetic practice in which moral and artistic values merge. While noting the limitations of Gandhi's position, the paper argues that his ethical aesthetics remains deeply relevant today— particularly as a critical response to the commodification of art and the displacement of artisan labour in the digital age. | ||
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