Trying to understand the divine game plan

In the beginning I was quite close to our new Secretary, Dr. Jayanti Ravi. Many people, myself included, were very happy when we learned that she has been selected to become the new Secretary of the Auroville Foundation. As she had been working closely with Kireet Joshi, we had high hopes that something of the spirit which Kireet had embedded in his work as Chairman of the Auroville Foundation would also filter through her. When I met her the first time, she told me that the only Aurovilian Kireet had been talking about had been me. So it was a happy opening. 

But my positive feelings were not shared by all Aurovilians I spoke to. The Secretary has an incredible energy and drive. She has met with a great number of people, and has shaken Auroville up and out of its comfort zones. But many people felt that anything they told her that did not agree with her views was not listened to, or was only given casual attention. In my case, my advice regarding the Vodaphone cell phone tower, the Youth Centre and the Darkali Forest was not heeded.

I often felt impelled to try again, to meet her and convince her to take another direction. At least six or seven times I attempted just that. But though our interactions were always cordial and friendly, my suggestions went unheeded. In our last meeting the tone changed: I was pressured to collaborate in the manifestation of the Crown. But I am not acting under pressure; this is the worst thing you can do to me. You bully me, you put pressure on me, you coerce me, I will give the opposite response. So I replied that I would do what I have to do. Like Luther, when he said “Here I stand, I can do no other, so help me God.”

Obstruction or sanity?

So when next morning the bulldozers came to Darkali, I was there. My son-in-law Sukrit hurried over to me and told me that my daughter was in trouble, sitting in front of a tree and refusing to move away. My first impulse was to protect my daughter and I rushed down. But there was no violence. Aurosylle was quietly explaining that this is a forest. The official spokespersons of the Foundation were there as well. We were standing on a corridor which had already been cleared by the residents of Darkali themselves, a corridor which was intended to be used for the Crown. But the Foundation representatives did not want to follow the stretch that was cleared, and insisted on clearing the beautiful forest a few metres to the side, which has grown over the last 50 years. For that was the exact circle of the Crown, 638 metres from the Banyan tree. They also didn’t care that in doing so, they also would destroy a large water catchment area which is essential for Auroville and the neighbouring villages. For me, this is insane. I took the tape to show them that a small deviation from the holy 638 metres wouldn’t even be noticed – but they wouldn’t listen. And now I am accused of obstruction and the Auroville Foundation has filed a police complaint against me.

Fear and Plan B

It brings in fear, a real fear, and I cannot deny that I am suffering from it, especially at 2 o’clock in the morning, the hour of the demons. I understand all those non-Indians who are looking at the conflict from the sidelines and do not want to get involved. The entire story has once again exposed the weakness of the position of foreigners in Auroville. Many are afraid to speak out, for fear of vindictive actions and ultimately the loss of their right to stay in India. And that is not an idle fear. We all know the names of long term Auroville residents of foreign origin who were not allowed to ever come back to Auroville, with the Government not giving any reason for its decision.

So then you start thinking of ‘Plan B’, which means leaving Auroville for another place. For many Aurovilians, this would be an unimaginable scenario, as they, like me, have spent all their savings in Auroville, have no money left, and are of an age where they would not be able to even find employment in their home country. When I surrendered all my material possessions to The Mother – it was a very considerable sum of money – I felt an immense joy and liberation, and I believe I could not have done what I did afterwards if I hadn’t done this. But now, in this situation, there is sometimes a nagging doubt coming up if I did the right thing. And that cuts deep. The Doubting Thomas cannot be easily dismissed. Recently, because of COVID’s travel restrictions, I had to spend nine months in France and Germany. I visited the places where I had grown up and I realized that I could live there. Plan B, in my case, would be the vanaprastha, the forest dweller, and I realized that it doesn’t really matter where that ‘forest’ is. But living without funds will not be easy.

Trying to find the deeper meaning

I have reflected a lot on the deeper meaning of what has been happening. There is, as Mother has said, something of a divine game plan, where each person gets a window where he or she has to act. All the influential actors of the past, such as Shyamsundar Jhunjhunwala, Satprem, Kireet Joshi, Pranab Bhattacharya, Navajata, had a particular role to play at one given moment. Without them, there would have been a missing piece. But the problem is always that the ego attaches itself to what they are meant to do, and then it becomes a ‘personal’ agenda. The Secretary spoke to me that she had seen the manifestation of the Crown as her low-hanging fruit. But there are so many low-hanging fruits. The infamous apple in the Garden of Eden was also a low-hanging fruit. But was there a true need to go that way?

In the multiplicity and diversity of Auroville, each one plays a certain role. It makes judging people almost impossible. I cannot say what is the right and true thing to do for anybody. I hardly know if I myself have always been doing the right and true thing. Looking at the happenings from a deeper level, I realize that it doesn’t help to further the polemic that ‘they are bad’ and ‘we are good’; we have to get to an approach that looks at oneness, the underlying oneness in which we all are connected. But the seeking for that oneness is not a happy all-hold-hands affair; it is painful, it is like an electric wire and when you touch it, you get a shock. So this Sunday morning I asked Sri Aurobindo, “What is your message for me?” and the word which sprung up from Savitri was “laughter”. I was stunned – forests are cleared, people are depressed or very upset and this is the answer? But I realised that there is an emerging lightness behind it all. We got so serious and so heavy, because the continental plates of Auroville have moved. We are in the process of the dance of Shiva, and that is often painful.

Looking back I realize that we, the residents, have been at fault as well. We know that the Auroville Foundation Act has recognized the Residents’ Assembly as one of its three authorities, but we have not properly executed that power, probably because there is a fear of power abuse. But nature abhors a vacuum, and then other elements come in to fill that gap. We are now starting again with meetings of the Residents’ Assembly; let us hope that there is a sanity coming in, that we can look for that which has brought us here, has united us and which again can bring us together.

Going through the religious phase

I had another internal reflection on the belief of those who think that the Charter of Auroville and the Galaxy Plan are at the same level, and that if you go against it, you go against what The Mother wanted. Some would call this adhering to a religion. And then I realized that I, and many of my friends, have also gone through a religious phase, and people think. In my experience, many in search of oneness with the Divine, the Unio Mystica, go through that phase where suddenly you get tired and cling to symbols and forms and make those the carrier and ignore the living content. Some of us in the fight with the Sri Aurobindo Society had the same obsession. I remember that and regret it. I was caught in it, too.

I have been trying to understand it. Sri Aurobindo writes about the ordinary mental level, an easy and necessary level where we coordinate things, and about higher levels. I believe that many of us have reached such a higher level. But the problem is that that higher level doesn’t give the full truth. They touch a portion of the truth and cling to it and think ‘that is the truth’. But what is absolutely necessary is to realize that there are many, many, many other truths. It is the story of the blind men touching the elephant.

So can we challenge the belief system of those who cling to the perfect circle or cling to the radials or cling to whatever Mother has said and wish to see that carved in stone? Can we challenge the belief system of those who want to grow organic? Can each of us perhaps see that the truth we hold is incomplete, a truth with a twist, so to say? More importantly, is it possible to combine two movements in a higher harmony? Can we all step back, realize that none of us is the guardian of the holy grail, look each other in the eye, get away from the computer and the digital communication, and meet, soul to soul, heart to heart?

Please no spiritual Disneyland

Then, of course, there is the ‘outside’. I am happy that the Government of India has set up a 53-member High Level Committee of former Prime Ministers, actors and spiritual leaders to commemorate the 150th birth anniversary of Sri Aurobindo at national and international levels. Sri Aurobindo is one of India’s national figures and has spoken about India as the guru of the world. For far too long, he has remained unknown and it is good that India and the world come to know about him and The Mother.

In this context Auroville has its role to play. The Mother gave her reasons for the creation of Auroville in that memorable talk with Satprem on February 3rd, 1968:

India has become the symbolic representation of all the difficulties of present-day humanity. India will be the site of its resurrection, the resurrection of a higher and truer life.

And the clear vision: the same thing which in the history of the universe has made the earth the symbolic representation of the universe so as to be able to concentrate the work at one point, the same phenomenon is occurring now: India is the representation of all human difficulties on earth, and it is in India that there will be the... cure. And it is for that – it is FOR THAT that I had to create Auroville.

So Auroville cannot escape being involved in the human difficulties and it is the dharma of the Aurovilians to try working them out. That could well mean that it will take many years for Auroville to grow and develop. I had a fear when I read the minutes of the 57th Governing Board meeting [elsewhere in this issue, eds.] and their approval of these large Government of India grants of 51 crores this financial year and 250 crores in each of the four successive years. My fear is that there is an intention to make Auroville a shining showpiece of a smart city, a spiritual Disneyland, with a Vedic embroidery around it. But that would be a mockery and not correspond to the true raison d’être of Auroville.