He is revered as one of the greatest human rights champions and spiritual leaders of all time. Mahatma Gandhi, who advocated non-violent resistance and influenced civil disobedience protests for generations after him, is an international icon with a special connection to Potchefstroom and indirectly to the North-West University (NWU).

This connection is a special collection of hand-written legal documents by Gandhi himself and owned by the NWU. These are on display at an exhibition by the NWU Library Services and shed light on Gandhi’s time as an attorney in Johannesburg.

The collection consists of nearly 70 historical documents and correspondence dating as far back as the 1880s between him and then leading Potchefstroom attorney A.R. Fleischack.

“It is truly wonderful to read these documents that contain valuable information about life in Gandhi’s time and the many interesting legal cases he handled while working as an attorney,” says Adri Jansen, librarian for special collections at the NWU.

Gandhi and Fleischack were both attorneys at the time and Fleischack represented Gandhi when his clients had to appear in the Potchefstroom court, Adri says. Fleischack later donated the documents to the university for safekeeping and preservation.

These valuable and unique documents are now showcased in the foyer of the Ferdinand Postma Library but if it hadn’t been for an astrophysics professor’s love of philately, it might have been lost to today’s generation.

Passion for philately preserves documents

The late Prof Okkie de Jager, esteemed international astrophysicist and the holder of the first research chair in astrophysics at the former Potchefstroom University for Christian Higher Education, had a passion for philately ― the study of postal history.

“It was this hobby, his love of postmarks and the history related to them, that led him to find and preserve the Gandhi correspondence that is now on display. He was interested in more than just stamps but in the origin and timeline of postal documentation,” says his widow Dr Estie de Jager.

She recalls that in the early 2000s, someone at the NWU library contacted Okkie, telling him that there were boxes of old documents and correspondence in the basement of the library that were going to be thrown away. He was invited to see if there was anything he, as a philatelist, wanted to keep.

“He then ‘disappeared’ for two weeks solid, burying himself in the boxes and boxes of documents. He was so excited; every letter and every document had meaning to him.” Estie says he told her he never expected to discover a great find such as the Gandhi documents, which had accidently wound up in the boxes that were going to be discarded.

Through Okkie’s hard work, the Philatelic Association of South Africa showcased the first exhibition of the documents soon after he found them.

“In a way it is still Prof Okkie’s exhibition that we see now,” says Adri. “We owe it to him. This is why we decided to honour his legacy as part of the Gandhi documents exhibition by including his story in the showcase.

She says NWU Library Services is now on a mission to show these documents to a wider audience. “The next step is to digitise the whole collection of documents and publish them online for all to enjoy.”

Until this is done, she invites everyone who is interested to visit the library to view the exhibition, which will be on display until December.

The collection in the foyer of the North-West University’s Ferdinand Postma Library in Potchefstroom.

Dr Estie de Jager, widow of Prof Okkie de Jager, proudly shows a book that highlights Prof Okkie’s valuable collection of philatelic artefacts. The special book was given to her by Okkie’s friend, Gerhard Kamffer, after he helped to sell the entire collection to Brian Trotter, who was chairman of the Royal Philatelic Society London at the time.

A.R. Fleischack was a leading attorney in Potchefstroom and collaborated with Gandhi in many of the legal cases that Gandhi’s practice handled. This photo is used in the collection.

Mahatma Gandhi’s political and spiritual influence can still be felt today. This photo is used in the collection.

Adri Jansen, librarian for special collections at the NWU, showcases some of the valuable documents in Gandhi’s handwriting.

Prof Okkie de Jager.