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Today is October 2, and it's Gandhi's 138th birthday!
not coincidentally, today is also the International Day for Nonviolence, which was created just this past June when the United Nations adopted an Indian resolution to declare this day as such on Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi's birthday.

from wikipedia:
Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (October 2, 1869 – January 30, 1948) was a major political and spiritual leader of the Indian independence movement. He was the pioneer of Satyagraha — resistance through mass civil disobedience strongly founded upon ahimsa (non-violence) becoming one of the strongest philosophies of freedom struggles worldwide. Gandhi is commonly known and spoken of worldwide as Mahatma Gandhi (from Sanskrit, Mahatma: Great Soul) and as Bapu (in Gujarati, Father).
Gandhi first employed his ideas of civil disobedience in the Indian struggle for civil rights in South Africa. Upon his return to India, Gandhi helped lead poor farmers and labourers to protest oppressive taxation and widespread discrimination. Leading the Indian National Congress, Gandhi worked for the alleviation of poverty, the liberation of women, brotherhood, end to untouchability and caste discrimination and for the economic self-sufficiency of the nation. But Gandhi's work focused upon the goal of Swaraj — self-rule for India. Gandhi famously led Indians in the disobedience of the salt tax through the 400 kilometre (248 miles) Dandi March, and in an open call for the British to Quit India in 1942. However his goal, freedom, came at a heavy cost; tens of thousands died in all of his movements as they clashed with the British.
Gandhi remained committed to non-violence and truth even in the most extreme situations. Gandhi was a student of Hindu philosophy and lived simply, organizing an ashram that was self-sufficient in its needs. He made his own clothes and lived on a simple vegetarian diet. He used rigorous fasts for self-purification as well as a means of protest. All this was mainly done to raise the status of India's depressed classes and draw them into the freedom struggle. Gandhi's teachings have inspired civil rights leaders such as Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Steve Biko, Nelson Mandela and Aung San Suu Kyi. Gandhi is honoured as the Father of the Nation in India and his birthday on October 2 is annually commemorated as Gandhi Jayanti, a national holiday.