By Lois Rogers | Correspondent

As the fifth grandson and leading disciple of India’s apostle of non-violence Mohandas K. Gandhi, it only seems logical that Dr. Arun Gandhi would be asked what insight and advice his legendary fore bearer would offer to a world as conflicted as ours today.

And indeed, during the question and answer session that followed Dr. Gandhi’s April 9 speech in Georgian Court University’s Casino Auditorium, members of the 200-plus audience of students, faculty, staff and members of the community at large, did just that.

Questions ranged from local issues – how social harmony can be reached among the factions in Lakewood’s diverse community – to far ranging topics including inclusion and peace in the wake of terrorism, international conflicts, immigration debates, and the religious, political and ideological differences that impact the globe.

His primary advice was to encourage each listener to take on the challenges of society in a very personal way, recognizing what they could help to improve in their own lives, neighborhoods and communities at large.

Particularly, when it came to grappling with what he called today’s “culture of violence,” he asked everyone to do their part, to lead by example in ending the anger which fuels so many frightful situations at home and around the world.

Dr. Gandhi confessed that as a youth, he struggled mightily to overcome his own tendency to violence. In poignant and sometimes humorous remarks, the peace activist and proponent of nonviolence shared his grandfather’s role in transforming his grandson’s desire to take an “eye-for-an-eye” stand against racism in his native South Africa. There, as a youngster, he said, he was beaten by “white” South Africans for being too black and by “black” South Africans for being too white.

He revealed that he had joined a gym to “learn how to pump iron” so he could “give back” some of what he was getting. It was at that point that his parents took the step of sending him to India to live with his grandfather and grandmother where they hoped he would learn that seeking justice should not mean getting revenge, but rather, transforming opponents through love and sacrifice.

He related how his parents coped with the bad behavior of their children by doing penance when they were naughty. He offered this example: “My mother would cook a meal and they would serve it, but then they would sit with us and not eat.”

It wasn’t long before the children were better behaved in the home, he said.

With his grandparents in India, he strove to become “peaceable and productive.” Among the lessons from his grandfather was to keep an “anger journal” – in which he wrote “any event of the day that you regret and then look for a solution.”

“People tell me today that writing about anger, pouring anger into a journal, helps to relieve their anger,” he said. “I did this for many years. … It is important to learn how to deal with anger. Anger management is the cornerstone of (his grandfather’s) philosophy of nonviolence.”

Dr. Ghandi shares such lessons in talks given to gatherings around the world.  A journalist who worked for 30 years for The Times of India, he co-founded the M.K. Gandhi Institute for Nonviolence based at the University of Rochester. He and his late wife, Sunanda, and their friends, organized India’s Center for Social Unity which developed self-help and economic models for the country’s rural poor.

Along with concern about outright violence, he also shared concerns about “passive violence,” which includes the “casual treatment of goods,” and deplored an attitude of over consumption which has led, he said, according to a New York Times article to discarding “120 billion dollars of food a year.”

“It goes down the drain which is a massive feat of passive violence when there are so many hungry people in the world.”

“... I learned my lessons at age 12 through 14 and I’m 81 now,” said Gandhi, who urged everyone to focus on creating goals to combat violence in their own lives. “Scale down,” he said. “Don’t waste. Don’t over consume. Try to help other people. Be more compassionate.”

For Dr. Kasturi Das Gupta, who served 10 years as chair of the university’s sociology department, and studentsAnna Mead, those admonitions are already in play. They appreciated the chance to hear them so directly from Gandhi’s grandson.

Mead said that the talk was an opportunity to experience “world issues and see how they change and come together.”

Das Gupta, author of the new text-book, “Introducing Social Stratification,” Lynne Rienner Publishers, shared a personal connection with the evening’s subject.

 “Both of my parents were disciples of Gandhi. … They were brought together because they were his followers. They were from two different communities and spoke different languages” but they fell in love. In those days, all marriages were arranged, she said, and marrying for love was not done.

But when her father sought the Mahatma’s blessing, he gave his assent. “It meant a lot to me to think that the Mahatma gave his blessing and it was very important to hear the message of nonviolence from his grandson. To hear that it is not just a practice in public but can be practiced in daily life with how we treat each other and the earth. That it’s not just about civil disobedience but about changing society,” Dr. Das Gupta said.