Once a tiny hamlet inhabited by Harijan weavers, Bhujodi exuded the symphony of the loom that had internalised both Kabiriyat and Gandhiness, their rhythm and rigour of austerity. I was meeting the master weaver Vashram (Vishram) Vankar (weaver) in his Bhujodi house-cum-workshop-cum sales depot that has a sprawling verandah with a cow-shed and a loom, nearly half a century after I first met him. Stoutly resisting the lure of showing off, Vashram and his family have still retained the Gandhian simplicity with compassion. The 80-year-old Vashram reads newspapers without specs, uses no hearing aids, wears the home-spun coarse cotton clothes, dons a deshi Gandhi cap and keeps chanting Gandhi Bapu! Gandhi Bapu! He even reminded me that the date of our meeting was Vinoba Bhave’s 130th birth anniversary. Vashram Vankar of Bhujodi (near Bhuj, Kutch) is an epitome of Mahatma Gandhi in Gujarat today.

In Gujarat, to my mind, Gandhi lives institutionally and instinctually. Gujarat has always offered a strange mix of responses to Gandhi. You’d need to feel them down to earth. Gandhi never ever returned to Gujarat after November 2, 1936, but still he smiles his toothless smile here.

It is, perhaps, the prevailing Jaina ethos........

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