Rahul M.

Sharmila Joshi

Editor

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“We found your number in Gandhi’s diary. He was hit by a car near the
highway and he died,” B. Krishnaiah, a ration shop owner and political
activist, told me on the phone around 7:30 p.m. on Sunday, December 9. 

I last met Gangappa – or ‘Gandhi’ – walking on that Bangalore-Hyderabad highway on November 24. It was
around 10:30 a.m. He was on his way to
Anantapur town to start his day in his Gandhi costume. He was staying at a
roadside eatery in Raptadu
village, roughly eight kilometres
from Anantapur. “Around two months ago, someone told me there is an
old man who needs a place, so I let him stay here. I even gave him food
sometimes,” says Venkatrami Reddy, the owner of the eatery. Krishnaiah, who
phoned me, often drank tea here and occasionally chatted with
Gangappa. 

I had written a <a href="https://ruralindiaonline.org/articles/from-gangappa-to-gandhi">story</a> about
Gangappa for PARI in May 2017. He was around 83 years old then. After 70 years
as an agricultural labourer, he had refashioned himself as the Mahatma – dressing
up as Gandhi and positioning himself in public places across Anantapur town in
western Andhra Pradesh. The alms he received amounted to a better income
than what he had earned from agricultural labour.

Gangappa had retired as a labourer in 2016 after he fainted while working
in the fields. Then he started braiding ropes for money, but his old man’s dexterity
didn’t pay much. That was when he decided to dress up as Gandhi.

His do-it-yourself costume was improvised using everyday objects. He
used Pond’s powder from a 10-rupee plastic box to make himself “shine” like the Mahatma. Cheap sunglasses purchased from a roadside shop were his Gandhi
spectacles. A 10-rupee cane from the local market was his walking stick. He used
a motorbike’s rear-view mirror, which he had found somewhere, to check his make-up
and costume.

In this way, since August 2016, every day, Gangappa transformed into Gandhi
and stood on the streets of Anantapur or went walking to fairs and monthly markets
in the surrounding villages and towns, earning anything between Rs. 150-600 a
day. “I made about 1,000 rupees in a day at one parsha [village fair] recently,” he had told me, proudly. 

That a frail man can like Gandhi could shake an empire and
bring it down inspired Gangappa when he was a child, he had said. He believed
travelling and patience were essential to being Gandhi. And by being on the move
and constantly meeting new people, Gangappa also tried to escape a reality that
haunted him through his life – his Dalit (Madiga) caste.

When I first met Gangappa, he asked me to not write about his caste
because he was sleeping at night at a temple in Anantapur, where he had not told anyone
he was from a Dalit community. Even when  dressed up as Gandhi, he used
religious symbols like a sacred thread and kumkum to try and look ‘priestly’.

Despite the impersonation, Gangappa’s caste and poverty followed him
everywhere. When I met his estranged wife M. Anjanamma, and took a
family picture in 2017, one of the kids who played at their village home didn’t
want to be in the picture alongside Dalits.

When Krishnaiah called me on Sunday, I gave him some details from my story
notes and sent him the photo of Gangappa’s family. When I was not able to give Anjanamma’s exact address, Krishnaiah
suggested we locate Gangappa’s village home by his caste (referring to the caste-demarcated localities in villages): &quot;May be we can try to find his home in Gorantla by his caste. Did he
ever tell you which caste he was from?&quot; 

Krishnaiah has a relative who knows the circle inspector in Gorantla – a village around 100 kilometres from
Anantapur – where Anjanamma lives with their younger
daughter. Their elder daughter, and only other child, committed suicide over a
decade ago.  A constable in Gorantla
informed Anjanamma about her husband’s death. She collected Gangappa’s body on
Monday afternoon, December 10.No one could identify the car that knocked down the frail old man.

Goodbye Gangappa

अलविदा गंगप्पा!

বিদায় গংগাপ্পা

వీడ్కోలు గంగప్పా!

‘ഗംഗപ്പാ, വിട’

ಗಂಗಪ್ಪನವರಿಗೊಂದು ವಿದಾಯ

अलविदा गंगप्पा उर्फ़ 'गांधी': जाति व ग़रीबी का दंश ताउम्र करता रहा जिनका पीछा

போய்வாருங்கள் கங்கப்பா

الوداع گنگپّا

বিদায় গঙ্গাপ্পা

ବିଦାୟ ଗଙ୍ଗାପ୍ପା

गंगप्पा, अखेरचा राम राम

Raptadu

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Goodbye Gangappa

Unable to continue doing agricultural labour, Gangappa began dressing up as Mahatma Gandhi and seeking alms in Anantapur. PARI had published a story on him in May 2017. Two days ago, a car knocked him down

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