Research Reinforcement Vol. 5, Issue 1 May 2017 - Oct. 2017 7 Introduction It will be clear by studying two historical personalities that their choice of nonviolence as a policy was clearly different. While Gandhi developed it as a fruitful weapon to attain political ends, as part of his novel idea of Abstract The unique contribution of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi is not in the field of nonviolence or ahimsa as is generally believed but in the field of nonviolent protests. Buddhaand Mahavir had the unique and pioneering contributions in the field of nonviolence in the world and they included all living beings unlike Jesus Christ. Buddha was more holistic when it came to defining nonviolence while the views of Swami Mahavir, founder of Jain faith, were extremist or impractical. In this paper, researchers won’t be going into the idea of nonviolence, according to the Jain faith. The aim of the paper is to juxtapose the views of Gandhi and Buddha as regards nonviolence, the similarities in view and the divergences, if any and what they considered comprised of violence. Before we come to their respective views pertaining to nonviolence, let us first look into the reasons why and how they grappled with this ever relevant issue of violence or nonviolence besetting mankind. To begin this analysis, we deal with their first experiences with nonviolence. Buddha had early emphasis on the importance of nonviolence, wanton killings made no sense to him. He took the help of logic and compassion to challenge it. During childhood when his cousin and a prince Devdutt shot at a swan, young Siddharth nursed the injured creature and refused to give it to Devdutt, giving the reason that he’d saved it so it belonged it him. Devdutt shot back that he had brought it down so it belonged to him. Both princess had held their ground. Not to let the bird slip away from him, which Devdutt considered his game, the matter was referred to the king and king decided in favour of prince Siddharth. So, a prince at a very young age, born in a warrior kshatriya clan chose to be on the side of nonviolence, compassion and parity between mankind and animal kingdom. Gandhi on the other hand was born in a Vaishnava family, whose cultural values emphasised on pure vegetarian food and a typical Hindu way of life filled with rites and rituals. Vaishnavas are worshippers of Vishnu.In the four-fold hierarchical Hindu classification of people, he belonged to the third tier from the top, that is, he was born in the Vaishya Varna. Vaishyas are generally considered peace loving as they are into businesses. Thus, it is seen that the family values of Gandhi favoured nonviolence and pacifism, his cultural background wasn’t antagonistic to the idea unlike Buddha’s. Buddha had no such roots. He went outside the moral compass of his clan to espouse nonviolence. Paper will talk about why and how. Keywords: Buddha, Gandhi, Nonviolence, Political Strategy, Mind, Maitri and Karuna Satyagraha that is “Truth (Satya) implies love, and firmness (Agraha) engenders and therefore serves as a synonym for force 1 . In Gandhi’s own words, ‘I thus began to call the Indian movement ‘Satyagraha’, that is to say, the Force which is born of Truth and Love or nonviolence 2 .’ See The Nonviolence of Gandhi and Buddha Prof. Sushma Yadav Professor of Policy and Governance, IIPA, and UGC Member, New Delhi Harish Kumar Research Scholar, Department of Political Science, University of Rajasthan, Jaipur (Raj.)