Reminiscences

She Stood Above Me

-M. K. Gandhi

Ba was not behind me in any essential respect. If anything she stood above me. But for her unfailing co-operation I might have been in the abyss....she helped me to keep wide awake and true to my vows. She stood by me in all my political fights and never hesitated to take the plunge in the current sense of the word, she was uneducated; but to my mind she was a model of true education. She was a devoted Vaishnava. But she had obliterated all feeling of caste from her mind and regarded a harijan girl with no less affection than her own children. She personified the ideal of which Narasimha Mehta has sung in the Vaishnavajan Hymn. There were occasions when I was engaged in a grim wrestle with death. During my Aga Khan Palace fast, I literally came out of death's jaws. But she shed not a tear, never lost hope or courage but prayed to God with all her soul.