Mohandas Gandhi: 1869-1948

MAX DESFOR / AP

With the Labour party in power in postwar London, independence for India was no longer a question of when, but of how. During negotiations with the British, Gandhi, featured here in 1946 seated with Jawaharlal Nehru, president of the Congress party and India's first prime minister, waged an unsuccessful campaign to join forces with the Muslim League to form an interim government, and keep Muslim and Hindu India united. "I do not want to die as a failure, but as a successful man. But it may be that I die a failure," he told an interviewer.

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