Dr. Bharat Lall serves as president and CEO of Pinnacle Hotels USA, Inc., based in San Diego. The company offers travelers the choice of nine high-quality properties comprising more than 1,700 rooms in Southern California and Texas. Bharat Lall, MD, is also community involved. His contributions to the San Diego Indian American Society (SDIAS) and the Mahatma Gandhi Memorial Scholarship reflect pride in his Indian heritage.
The SDIAS-administered scholarship benefits the community’s high school graduates while honoring the contributions Gandhi made to bettering life for all of humanity.
Gandhi was born Mohandas Gandhi (“Mahatma” is an honorific that means “Great Soul”) in the latter half of the 19th century. By the time of his death at the hands of an assassin in 1948, Gandhi had become one of the world’s best-known champions of human rights and the non-violent resistance to oppression. He garnered headlines for leading massive protests against British rule in India, an effort through which he demonstrated the power of committed individuals to effect positive change.
In 1930, he led the Salt March in protest against the British colonial officials’ monopoly on production of the mineral - a monopoly that controlled production with tariffs and excluded Indians from profiting from the salt industry.
Gandhi’s march of more than 200 miles to the sea coast, where he symbolically collected mineral salts in defiance of the law, led to his arrest and that of tens of thousands of his followers while shining a light on their cause throughout the world.
