Revision summary
Ethical core: truth, non-violence, means-ends unity, Antyodaya, trusteeship, satyagraha. Social core: swaraj, sarvodaya, constructive work, end of untouchability, bread labour, communal respect. Limits: inner voice can be unexamined; conversion of the rich often fails; a riot may need lawful force. The administrative test is the weakest user’s dignity on the file.
Model answer
Introduction
- Gandhi’s ethics and his social programme are one craft: satya and ahimsa are not private moods, and swaraj is not a flag. To examine them is to ask what they demand of the person and of the republic, and where they strain.
Body
Ethical ideas
- Satya: truth as a discipline of speech, search, and public life, not a metaphysical slogan; the ashram diary and the newspaper were workshops of confession.
- Ahimsa: refusal to treat the other as a tool, including the opponent; it is courage under cost, not cowardice, which is why he distinguished non-violence from weakness.
- Unity of means and ends: an unjust means cannot yield a just life; the spinning wheel and the salt march were ethics as method, not later polish on a seizure of power.
- Ends as persons: the ‘last man’ (Antyodaya) is the test of a policy; a reform that humiliates the weakest fails even if it wins a majority.
- Trusteeship of wealth and of office: property and the chair are held for others; greed is a spiritual and civic failure.
- Self-suffering (tapas) as moral force: satyagraha stakes one’s own body rather than the neighbour’s, which is the ethical core of civil resistance.
- Limits: critics say the ethic can underplay structural force, can strain against a just war or a police necessary to stop a riot, and can become a personality cult if the inner voice is unexamined.
Social ideas
- Swaraj as self-rule of the person and the village, not only transfer of the viceregal chair; Hind Swaraj’s critique of modern greed still asks what development is for.
- Sarvodaya and the constructive programme: sanitation, khadi, communal harmony, and the end of untouchability were social ethics as daily work, not a later ministry.
- Abolition of untouchability and temple entry: a frontal social idea that joined spiritual equality to civic dignity; Ambedkar’s sharper constitutional path remains a necessary critique of the pace.
- Bread labour and dignity of manual work: a social answer to caste contempt of the hand.
- Communal unity and sarvadharma samabhava: equal respect among faiths as a condition of swaraj, not a private piety.
- Trusteeship versus class war: he sought conversion of the rich rather than expropriation as first method; the social limit is that conversion often fails, which is why a republic still needs land law, labour law, and tax.
- Case-ready: a district that cleans a well with the excluded caste, and a file that will not sell a posting, are Gandhi’s ethics and social ideas in administrative dress.
Flow diagram
flowchart TD S[Satya and ahimsa] --> E[Ethical person] E --> C[Constructive swaraj] L[Last person as test] --> C T[Trusteeship] --> C
Conclusion
Gandhi’s ethical ideas are satya, ahimsa, unity of means and ends, the last person as test, and self-suffering as force. His social ideas are swaraj, sarvodaya, the end of untouchability, bread labour, communal respect, and trusteeship. Examined critically, they need law and structure where conversion fails, and they still judge every chair that treats a citizen as a tool.
Quick related
Students also ask
-
Evaluate the relevance of the following in the context of Civil Service:
(a) Conscience
(b) Spirit of service
(c) Discipline
Next question in the 2018 paper (Q5). View answer →
-
Did Gandhi reject all force?
He rejected violence as a method of truth. He still distinguished cowardice from ahimsa, and a republic still needs lawful police; the ethical bar is not to make the innocent the tool.
-
Are Gandhi’s social ideas only rural nostalgia?
Village swaraj can be romanticised. The durable core is dignity of labour, an end to humiliation, and development that can face the last person.
Same topic · past papers
UPPSC has asked this before
These previous-year questions sit on the same topic. Open one to practise the earlier ask.
-
2019 · Q12 · UPGS4 · 12 marks
Examine the role of social and political ideas of Karl Marx in the field of contemporary public services.
More from this paper
Q1 · UPSC Mains 2018 · UPGS4 · 8 marks · Solution
What are the values? Throw light over their central elements.
Civil Service aptitude and values
A value is a stable criterion of the worthy, not a passing mood or an unexamined habit. It differs from need and from law, though it must live with both. Central elements are stability, preferential ranking, cognition joined to affect, and a force that issues in conduct. Values are socially taught yet open to public reason, and they sit in a hierarchy when goods clash. A wall motto that never meets a file is not yet a value.
Q2 · UPSC Mains 2018 · UPGS4 · 8 marks · Solution
Define the ethical concerns in Government and Private Institutions.
Ethics and Human Interface
Government ethics is fiduciary: tax and force are not a private purse. Concerns are equality, neutrality, open files, conflict of interest, and the weakest user’s dignity. Private ethics is profit that must still justify wage, product, effluent, and books. Concerns are misselling, labour chains, capture, and data power. Both can lie; only the state owes the Constitution first.
Q3 · UPSC Mains 2018 · UPGS4 · 8 marks · Solution
What is the philosophical basis of probity in the governance? Discuss critically.
Probity in Governance
Probity is inspectable upright dealing, not a private glow. Its basis is trust (Locke, Gandhi), Kantian respect, Aristotelian and dharmic habit, Weberian impersonality, and Ambedkar’s constitutional morality. Critique: sermons fail without CVC, PCA, and a trail; rigor without equity can crush; virtue can be theatre; utility can excuse a bribe; dharma can become caste. The officer’s test is a speaking file under cost.