Shri Baba as a Spiritual Master does not believe in halfway methods of indiscriminate charities which is a special feature of most of the upliftment programs. Such an occasion as this, which has evoked an inquiry from you, is deliberately created for bringing about mass contact, and the bhandaras [feasts] and such stereotyped charities (a feature of Indian life) are resorted to in the interest of the ultimate design — the imparting of the spiritual touch of the Master!
During this distribution of grain and cloth and sweetmeat laddoos to thousands on the 17th, Shri Baba touched the feet of each recipient of his prasad with his own hands, a procedure which we, in Gujarati, call pagay padvu [bowing down]. This prasad, it may be pointed out, was given to all who came to receive it — rich and poor alike of all creeds. The spiritual significance of this prasad, as could be gathered from your letter under reply, seems to have been lost sight of in its being misinterpreted as "help to beggars."
Another important feature of this gathering was the participation of Shri Baba's Western devotees in such a public function for the first time, when they mixed freely with the Indian devotees and others, and had two common meals with all in the same "sitting" which included all classes and creeds — the Hindus (Brahmins as well as Untouchables), Muslims, Parsis, Iranis, Christians (Western as well as Indian), all on the same level with Shri Baba among them, which brought out love and brotherhood as never witnessed before.
With loving regards, as ever.
In reply, Mahatma Gandhi wrote Chanji:
March 10, 1937 Segaon, Wardha My dear Dadachanji,
I am glad you told me something of what happened on the 17th. For the moment, however, I cannot see eye-to-eye with you. Let us hope that some day I shall understand the events described by you and what will happen hereafter in the same way as you say. Surely, all castes, classes, rich and poor and all nationalities have before now been represented at the same board and have eaten together in a spirit of love and brotherhood. This is not a new phenomenon. But it is useless to discuss a thing when angles of vision differ.
On Thursday, 11 March, Baba gathered the men mandali and explained to them:
To be frank and fair is a quality and characteristic of persons who are honest and have the courage to openly say out what they feel rather than to keep things in the heart or say things behind people's backs.