"A sturdy old Muslim villager of Multan cam in, rushing and jostling his way through the impeding volunteers, shook hand with Gandhiji and sat down. He was in the highest spirits, but then Maulana Mohammad Ali told him, "Do you know he is on a roza (fast) of 21 days-because Muslims and Hindus do not stop fighting?" THe old man grew pale and began to grumble, "Somebody incites badmashes of both the communities and so all these brawls. But none of us there is quarrelling" and with these words he too began to urge, "Take but a quarter pound of milk daily. Eat very sparingly, say, even on alternate days, but please do some such thing; for, in the case of a person like you, every act is a prayer to God whether you sit or stand, eat or drink." Highly pleased Gandhiji said, "And can this also not be a prayer? This abstinence from eating-this roza?" The question puzzled the simple old man, "But do listen to the earnest entreaty of such a nobody like myself; and eat." And then as he left, he said, "I will come again after ten or twenty days." "Do come," said Bapu, "after twenty days.""
Mahadev Desai

January 1, 1970

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