Gandhi Memorial Museum Madurai - Father of the Nation

Located in the heart of Madurai, the extensive Gandhi memorial museum houses a wealth of remarkable mementoes associated with Indian history including the bloodstained cloth Gandhi was wearing when he was assassinated in 1948. The building that houses the museum is the historic Tamukkam Palace belonging to Rani Mangammal of Nayak Dynasty, built about 1670 A.D. However, this palace came under rulers of other dynasties and also East India Company during the colonial era. It was in 1955, when this palace was gifted to All India Gandhi Smarak Nidhi by the Tamil Nadu Government. It was done with the purpose of creating a museum for Gandhi.

Jawaharlal Nehru, the first prime minister of independent India inaugurated the premises on 15th April 1959. The plethora of appetizing information with the help of illustrations and graphic representations convey an understanding of the struggle for freedom during the British era. It was in Madurai in 1921, that Gandhiji adopted for the first time the loin cloth as his mode of dress. It has a huge treasury of objects and writings of Mahatma Gandhi’s life. The galleries of the museum display the chronicles of the pre-independent nation during an era when unfortunate atrocities were committed by the British. Special collections include historic stamps of the British ruled India and letters written to and by Mahatma Gandhi.

The letters sent to the poet / activist Subramania Bharati and infamous dictator Adolf Hitler are kept here. A wonderfully assorted selection of books is stacked in the library here and gives us a glimpse of the days gone by. The most interesting part of the museum is the sections containing 124 rare photographs of Gandhi's personal life. It has photographs of various stages of his life. The museum is also home to around 100 relics and replicas of artifacts about Gandhi. The library here consists of the books that highlight the cultural backdrop of the country. There are about 62 reels of short films and 270000 letters of Gandhi, which are the most significant elements of this library.