Mewa Ramgobin, who has died at the age of 83, was one of six members of the United Democratic Front who sought refuge from the South African security police in the British consulate in Durban in 1984. They were on the run from the police after the UDF had brought a successful application for their release from detention. Before they could be rearrested they were whisked away from prison and into hiding for several days. With the police searching for them high and low, they were smuggled to the British consulate.Their stay there was headline news around the world. This made it impossible for the British to hand them over to the police, but they did what they could to make them feel unwelcome. They were confined to one room containing a chemical toilet all day and night except for an hour for exercise, and made to sleep on the floor without mattresses.About a month after arriving, Ramgobin, a successful insurance broker who lived in a beautiful house in Verulam and enjoyed his creature comforts, had had enough and left with two others, ignoring warnings that they would be arrested.This was exactly what happened the moment they set foot outside the consulate. The others, including 78-year-old UDF president Archie Gumede, left the consulate in December and were also arrested. They were all, with 10 others, charged with treason in the Pietermaritzburg treason trial, which began in 1985 and ended with their acquittal a year later.Ramgobin was born on his father's sugar cane farm in Inanda, KwaZulu-Natal, on November 10 1932. When he was 17 he left home after a huge row with his father over the way his dad had treated a black farmworker.While studying for a political science degree at the then University of Natal he became an anti-apartheid activist in the National Union of South African Students.In 1965 he was served with the first of several five-year banning orders (in all he spent 17 years under banning orders). When it expired in 1970, he started a committee for the release of political prisoners and organised a petition for clemency for Nelson Mandela and Walter Sisulu, among others.He was promptly banned again and remained under house arrest until February 1973. In March a parcel addressed to him was found in a refuse bin in his office building in Durban and taken to him in his fifth floor office.He opened it very gingerly. It was a book. As he lifted the cover he saw it was attached to some sort of mechanism and instinctively flung it aside. As it hit the desk behind him it exploded.Within minutes the Security Branch were all over his office although no one had called the police. They removed all the debris "for forensics". Nothing more was heard about it.He was then restricted to his residential area of Verulam. In 1975 he was banned for another five years. When this expired the security police visited him at his home and told him his banning order had officially expired. They congratulated him and said it would not be renewed. While he was savouring this information they told him they were joking and served him with another five-year banning order.This prompted a furious article from his friend Alan Paton (they used to prune the roses together at the Phoenix settlement started by Manilal Gandhi).Ramgobin, who was married to Gandhi's granddaughter Ela and espoused his philosophy of nonviolent protest, did not advocate violence, wrote Paton. "It would be strange if he did, as a member of Gandhi's family."He said if they banned him again, "which they have decided to do, he will handle his ban in such a way that he will inspire others to say and do the things he believes in".Ramgobin played a leading role in reviving the Natal Indian Congress in the 1970s and making it an important contributor to the struggle against apartheid.When his banning order was lifted in 1983 he became a founding member and national treasurer of the UDF.Nobody ever questioned Ramgobin's commitment to the struggle or his courage. But there was no love lost between him and the communists in the UDF. He accused them of "white anting" the ANC. They in turn thought he was ambitious, self-serving, divisive and strategically unsophisticated.He could certainly be bombastic (this helped make him a wonderful orator) and vain. He had an almost Trump-like obsession about his hair and liked showing off his vocabulary.Once when he finished a speech the audience was told he'd be happy to answer questions. An elderly man got to his feet. "Next time could you come with a spare dictionary?" he asked.Ramgobin became an ANC MP in the post-1994 government. Although he kept his seat in parliament for 15 years he was aggrieved that he was never given a senior appointment.He is survived by his second wife, Mariam, and five children. His son Kush died after being shot in mysterious circumstances in 1993. His marriage to Ela, who was banned for almost as many years as he was, ended in 1991.1932-2016..