Q. = Mahatma Gandhi never won the
Nobel Peace Prize. But how many times he was nominated for the Nobel Peace
Prize ?
Answer = Five.
Beginning in 1937, Indian leader Mohandas Gandhi was
nominated for the award five times. His final nomination came
just weeks after his assassination in January 1948. At that point in its
history, the Nobel Committee had never awarded a prize posthumously, though its
original governing charter did allow for this in extenuating circumstances.
However, the committee determined that Gandhi had left behind no suitable heirs
or organizations able to accept the award or its prize money. Unwilling to
bestow the award posthumously, yet recognizing Gandhi’s lifelong commitment to
non-violence, they instead decided not to award that year’s peace prize to
anyone, stating that there were no “suitable living candidates” worthy of the
award.
(The Gandhi controversy endures: In 1961, Dag Hammarskjöld,
Secretary-General of the United Nations, was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize,
even though he had died in a plane crash earlier that year. When the Dalai Lama
was awarded the peace prize in 1989, he announced that he was accepting the
award, in part, as a tribute to Gandhi. And, in 2006, more than 50 years after
Gandhi’s death, the Nobel Committee itself publicly acknowledged the omission,
expressing regret that Gandhi had never been awarded the prize).
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