[Gandhiji's mother]

"…I carry one great consolation for me and that I shall go back without having taken meat or wine and that I know from personal experience that they are so many vegetarians."

At nineteen, Gandhiji sailed from Bombay for England on September 4th, 1888 to qualify at the bar. This became necessary due to his father’s death earlier which had strained the means of his family. Being the only boy in the family who had persevered in his studies, all hopes rested on him. A foreign degree would be of definite advantage in the competition for the plums of public service.

In taking the decision, he was ex-communicated by the elders of the Modh Bania caste to which the Gandhi’s belonged for a trip to England was a violation of the Hindu religion. Nevertheless, he was made to make a solemn vow by a Jain monk, Becharji Swami that he would not touch wine, women or meat while he was away from the shores of India and it was with pride that he wrote in his article in 'Vegetarian' of June 20, 1891, ‘…I carry one great consolation for me and that I shall go back without having taken meat or wine and that I know from personal experience that they are so many vegetarians.’

When he returned to India, a great shock lay in store for him. His mother had died while he was in England. The news of the tragedy had been deliberately withheld from him. It was a cruel blow for him. ‘Most of my cherished hopes were shattered,’ he wrote in his autobiography. His mother’s austere life, immutable faith and the boundless love that his mother had for him were indelibly printed on his mind. She was perhaps the biggest single influence in shaping Gandhiji’s philosophy in life.

The barristers’ degree did not help Gandhi to earn a decent income.Brokerage to "touts" for briefs secured through them was an accepted mode of building up practice, but to Gandhi it was something beneath the dignity of his profession. He had a flair for drafting memorials and petitions and discovered that he could make a living out of it.From Bombay,he shifted back to Rajkot where petition writing brought him in an income of 300 rupees a month.