'Quit India' Political Speech | Paper One

The preeminent leader of the Indian independence movement in British ruled-India Mahatma Gandhi presented the Quit India speech on the 8th of August in 1942 calling for abiding support in his case to resolve an Independent India. His speech, as most political speeches, contains decisive rhetoric reinforcing the message he is imposing onto his audience; gaining their votes in favor of his manifestation to achieve peace amongst the British and the Indians disregarding British Imperialism. Gandhi is able to persuade his audience by the use of various rhetorical devices influencing the urgency of the mood and tone of the speech, achieving a meaningful takeaway to his case by implementing allusions and metaphors, and lastly executing a strong consistent style and structure which enforces his audience to focus.

Gandhi intensifies the tone and mood of the speech by using highly personal diction and evokes a sense of urgency, which encourages his audience to undertake action and acknowledge the essence of shared responsibility and collaboration. The mood that is created through the imperative mode calls for urgency and undertaking. Gandhi uses the rhetorical device metanoia to express his respect towards the British people. He wants to accentuate the fact that British people are great friends to him and that this is completely irrelevant to the issue regarding British imperialism in India. Gandhi achieved this objective by recalling this statement in a stronger and more powerful manner to persuade his audience that peace and respect are the two key elements to attain the goal of a substantive India. He is hereby also able to stress the urgency in which he imposes his manifestation; he wants to resolve to peace as fast as possible. In addition, Gandhi uses anastrophe in his speech to lend emphasize on his aim to achieve freedom without the use of violence but with the ideal of achieving equal freedom.

Gandhi is also explicit when it comes to shaping meaning in his speech: he uses the rhetorical device metaphor to evoke empathy amongst his audience in his case to strive for non-violence, he said: ‘when the earth is being scorched by the flames of Himsa and crying for deliverance’. Gandhi is a historical phenomena due to his incredible mindset in which he promoted peace and equal respect. The second paragraph following the introduction, Gandhi uses the rhetorical device allusion provoking a sense of emotion amongst his audience, as he recalls his aspirations in life and reassures his audience that he strives harder in his case to peace. This emotional pull also derives from the device pathos, in which Gandhi is able to attract compassion from his audience in addressing his case to end all violence. Gandhi refers to the witty knowledge of God, which means he uses allusion to seek compassion from is audience. He implicates God as the holy father of Ahimsa and all the positive attributes in life, which is extremely useful in his attempt to free India: religion is very important in their culture and serves as the covenant between the Indians. Furthermore, Gandhi is a man who treats everyone in equal respect; he is not to befall as aggressive or unkind. He remains this reputation by implementing metaphors such as this one: ‘cutting off the friendly hand that is stretched out to help them’. Gandhi does not want to sound very harsh in his view points regarding India’s current struggle to become an independent nation, he does not want to place the British in a bad perspective.

The structure and style of the speech cleverly contributes to persuading the audience to treat each other with equal respect and eliminate hatred towards the British people to aim for an independent India. Gandhi implements the rhetorical device metabasis, which is originally used to lead in a transitional summary. However Gandhi uses metabasis in his introduction to exact the attention of his audience. He is also very conscious of his diction: he uses personal pronouns suggesting a direct connection to his audience, invoking a sense of collectivity and shared responsibility. Hereby we can identify his audience to be the people of India who stand by his side supporting non violence, as he says “Before you discuss the resolution” suggesting the addressed audience is eager to impose on possible resolutions after Gandhi has shared his point of view on the case. In context of Gandhi’s roots, he is encouraged to include traditional diction to provoke credibility (ethos) amongst his audience, especially considering his audience includes the population of India who praise him. Ahimsa means ‘do not harm’ and ‘compassion’, so by promoting this aspiration Gandhi is able to gain moral support and ethical appreciation to his attempt to restore peace amongst the Hindus and the Muslims but also strive for an independent India. Also, Gandhi is well aware of his word choice; he uses fancy words because audience has grown to global beholders meaning his speeches should carry a sense of sophistication. 

There is excessive use of conjunctive adverbs present within Gandhi’s speech to insert a break, which encourages the public to absorb his knowledge. In addition, the substantial use of punctuation, especially the comma, supports the pace of the speech: it causes the speech to be more rhythmic and dramatic. The content of the speech is very important in order to activate the audience in voting for a resolution. The pauses created due to conjunctive adverbs and commas enforce the audience to take note of the phrase previous and preceding lines.

In conclusion, Gandhi approached his audience in an urgent mood and tone to activate and motivate the Indians to strive for an independent India, acquiring this goal without the use of violence or hatred towards the opposition. At the same time, Gandhi also acquired sensibility and trigger emotion amongst his audience by using allusions and metaphors persuading them to vote for an independent India. Lastly he executed a strong and consistent style and structure which enforced his audience to focus on the message Gandhi send out.