What makes Mahatma Gandhi a person of perennial influence? We know that he was a non-violent fighter for justice and freedom and was instrumental in achieving political independence for India from Britain, and that he inspired several subsequent non-violent movements all over the world. What is less known is that he asserted the primacy of ethics over expediency. This lecture considers this and other aspects of his remarkable life which make Gandhi as relevant today as he was a hundred years ago and as he may be a hundred years from now.