In response to the Auroville Today interview with FAMC member Torkil

Dear Torkil,

Many of us in Auroville have read the interview with you in the latest Auroville Today. It has been met with interest because it seems the first time that a member of the group speaks in some detail about the vision and beliefs of the GB-FAMC team. Until now the community has mostly experienced unexplained decisions and measures, many of which have been extremely disruptive to life individually and collectively.

What I take from the interview is that your actions are based on a number of goals that on the whole we all share. This is good news. Where the difficulties arise is in HOW you are trying to reach these goals. If we can improve our understanding of the latter, this would hopefully allow us to find ways of transforming the current reality while avoiding the trauma, damage and alienation that have shaken us all, bringing us closer to the divine Dream Mother invited us to realise.

Step 1: Goals we agree on:

1. Prosperity for all Aurovilians

2. Social security for children, senior citizens, and fair treatment of employees

3. Housing for all who serve Auroville

4. Aurovilians work for Auroville

5. Transparency, compliance with ground rules, elimination of corruption

6.  Growing a prosperous economy

7.  Food security and self-sustainability

8.  Bulk procurement of basic needs; streamlining of resources

9.  Visitors are valuable

10. Avoid court cases

11. A trusted FAMC with power to implement

12. Balancing needs – synergies and miracles

Step 2: How to move towards the goals

Here’s where it becomes interesting. We trust that you are as dedicated to the ideals of Auroville as any of us. And while a healthy economy is an indispensable foundation, Auroville has no meaning if its values and principles are sacrificed in the process. In other words, ‘the aim justifies the means’ simply cannot be the way to manifest Auroville.

Let’s have a look at the goals you have stated, and where your actions result in friction and disruption. Let’s explore if these same goals cannot be reached in ways that embody the spirit of Auroville, allowing a growth in harmony rather than shock, trauma and hardship.

To start with, a reflection on your belief that ‘development is by nature messy’, that there are no guarantees of outcome, and your affirmation that “we in the FAMC are painfully aware that the effect of our long ‘cleaning’ work has a negative impact on the growth potential of Auroville.”

True, in joining Auroville we have accepted Mother’s invitation to a journey into the unknown. Yet She has also equipped us with the essentials for the adventure, and all along, we get to experience again and again that the Divine’s way is one of harmony and grace, not of destruction and deprivation. So would we not attune ourselves to Her promise of a gradual emergence from the old world and beyond the present chaos into an unfolding divine wonder?

Here’s a look at our shared goals, with some basic reflections on their implementation:

1. Prosperity for all Aurovilians (basic needs such as food and clothing)

A great ideal. It is understood that spiritual development tends to reduce one’s material needs and desires. But Auroville is not conceived as an Ashram, and its goal of ‘unity in diversity’ means that this diverseness needs to be respected also in the material field. A reasonable freedom of choice catering to individual needs and natural affinities is therefore essential. ‘One size fits all’ won’t do for Auroville. Rather, a life “simply rich and beautiful” must be our aim (Sri Aurobindo).

2. Social security for children, senior citizens, and fair treatment of workers

Assuming that we all agree on these as non-negotiables, we expect those responsible to make sure they get fulfilled ASAP. (Calling the situation of the dismissed forest workers and refused gratuity ‘stupid’ may be apt, but does not restore justice to those affected!)

3. Housing for all who serve Auroville (free or affordable)

An agreed priority. Let’s not forget that:

– Participatory planning with the community is essential (Dreamweaving)

– While housing is urgently needed, it cannot be ‘build at any cost’: Auroville habitat needs to be respectful of the environment and bioregion, and as much as possible pioneer sustainable technologies (as per the Charter!)

– Sufficient choice must be given to suit individuals’ genuine needs and affinities. (Location, size, aesthetics… – 30 m2 per person is not a divine law!)

– Communities are living entities and while they are expected to welcome new members, their affinities should be taken into consideration.

4. Aurovilians work for Auroville

It is assumed that we all share the wish to see the tendency of separative individualism replaced by a greater community spirit, more dedication to the service of Auroville as a whole.

Sri Aurobindo beautifully shows us the future society:

All turned to all without reserve’s recoil:

A single ecstasy without a break,

Love was a close and thrilled identity

In the throbbing heart of all that luminous life. […]

There Oneness was not tied to monotone;

It showed a thousand aspects of itself […]

Each gave its powers to help its neighbours’ parts,

But suffered no diminution by the gift;

Profiteers of a mystic interchange,

They grew by what they took and what they gave,

All others they felt as their own complements,

One in the might and joy of multitude.

(Savitri: The House of the Spirit and the New Creation)

How then do we best create the conditions for the emergence of this consciousness?

5. Transparency, compliance with ground rules, elimination of corruption

There is not the slightest doubt that corruption (of any kind) has no place in Auroville. While addressing this is an important concern, painting a woeful picture of incompetence, unprofessionalism and ‘hardcore fraud’ as the predominant reality of Auroville, is neither truthful nor beneficial. For all the time, energy, and expense put into investigating units and individuals, it appears that very few serious financial improprieties were found. Meanwhile, can you imagine the impact of all this on the many Aurovilians who conduct their activities impeccably and in a spirit of service?

Making people feel controlled, hamstrung and monitored, treating them as ‘employees’ at best and as suspects at worst, is always counterproductive. In a place where everybody is essentially a volunteer, it undermines its very essence! The challenge given to us is to develop an environment where each one is encouraged to discover the joy ‘to surmount his weaknesses and ignorance, to triumph over his limitations and incapacities; a place where the needs of the spirit and the concern for progress take precedence over the satisfaction of desires and passions, the search for pleasure and material enjoyment’.

As for dealing with dishonesty and corruption, there is a growing consensus that we need some effective system of restorative justice by and for the community, a step which we have been long hesitating to take but which can no longer wait, and for which we have to call on our highest level of collective wisdom, integrity, maturity and receptivity.

6. Growing a prosperous economy

In shaping our economy, our beliefs are paramount. If we have the faith that money follows energy – and not the other way around – and that generosity and trust engender abundance, then we need to create a society that celebrates growing, learning, discovering, creating, and serving, supporting each person in their unique swabhava and swadharma.

Systems that stifle freedom, imagination, creativity, enthusiasm and initiative, lead to progressive paralysis of any economy, besides being direct contradictions of the spirit of Auroville.

About streamlining and re-aligning…

The GB-FAMC is critical of the multitude of small activities and units making little or no profit, considering them useless and seemingly intent on shutting them down.

While there can obviously be improvement in this domain, it is essential to remember that not all activities in Auroville are meant to be commercial. Research, education, arts, culture etc. are all investments in humanity’s future. Denying them support and forcing them to be financially ‘self-sustaining’ is to profoundly pervert them. Similarly, forcing community services into a profit-mould is against the very basics of Auroville.

As for ‘redirecting resources’ of the collective, this can only be effectively done with reasonable consultation and with the trust of the community, especially of those directly affected. One-sided impositions may bring short-term gain but result in long-term damage. 

You envision Auroville’s future economy based on a few ‘very big companies’, managed ‘professionally’ and separate from Auroville. What are the models for this? Since you don’t mention anything else, is financial profit the only benchmark for success? What about the equally important criteria of ethics, social and environmental sustainability, and research and innovation (boldly springing towards future realisations)?

The insistence on ‘very big companies’ seems a misunderstanding or an outdated paradigm that has been replaced even in mainstream thinking with a very different outlook. As stated by the Executive Director of the Joint Agency of the UN Conference on Trade and Development and the World Trade Organization in an article titled Micro-, Small and Medium-sized Enterprises Are Key to an Inclusive and Sustainable Future, “MSME’s are, quite literally, the foundations of the global economy.”

7. Food security for Auroville

Mother’s vision for Auroville to be largely self-sustaining in its food production has always been an agreed goal, even if still far from achieved.

Recently, however, our farms have been pushed to the edge of survival, due to maintenances cuts, public tender of their fruit trees, devastating land exchanges and re-purposing of land. 

The insistence on centralising farming, imposing uniform practices on vastly diverse conditions, and even talk of ‘agro-industry’, seem derived from an outdated paradigm similar to the plan to ‘streamline’ our businesses. Similarly, it is the United Nations that have recently recognised the vital importance of small farms for a sustainable future and food security.

A paper Assessing the value of Auroville’s farms has been shared with the Governing Board and the GB-FAMC in 2022 and 2023 respectively, but has received no response. Please request a copy if it is no longer available to you.

If food security and a self-sustaining town is still an accepted goal, then Auroville’s farms need to be supported rather than paralysed. A starting point would be a trusting dialogue, and invitation to the farmers to share their decades-long experience in working with Auroville’s earth.

8. Bulk procurement of basic needs, and sharing of resources

We read that past efforts at bulk buying of basic provisions have not been successful. Are the reasons for this failure known? Some centrally coordinated procurements should certainly be welcomed. Here too, apart from price, important criteria should be ecological, social and ethical sustainability, as well as a reasonable range of diversity, avoiding excessive uniformity.

Sharing of resources – administrative and others – is certainly an advantage, as long as it doesn’t adversely affect the functioning of participating activities and the quality of services. Experimentation being the very core of Auroville, this must not be discouraged by centralisation. Resource sharing is normally best planned by the participants themselves. The role of the FAMC can be in encouraging and facilitating the meeting of units and activities, and proposing different options of resource-sharing.

9. Visitors are valuable

While our community holds a range of attitudes towards visitors and guests, they are generally appreciated not only as a window of Auroville into the world, but also an important source of income. 

The push to maximise this revenue – following a recent trend in India to market ‘spiritual tourism’ – has the risk of visitors feeling exploited, with negative effects in the short and long term. 

A more essential question is how best to help visitors and guests to get in touch with the Divine Dream. What kind of Auroville is currently being showcased? What changes do we wish to make, allowing visitors a taste, or foretaste, of the City the Earth needs, the City at the service of Truth, the City of Dawn?

Ample experience shows that authenticity, a genuine welcome and generosity are more likely to open visitors’ hearts and willingness to support Auroville than glossy tourist facilities. The world is full of wealth that is waiting to be channeled to where its owners find true inspiration, hope and trust.

10. Avoid court cases

We all agree that legal action has a heavy price and should have no place in Auroville. Each case filed has been a last resort to safeguard Auroville and its ideals. Today, major cases which had received balanced rulings restoring the provisions of the Auroville Foundation Act are stuck due to appeals filed by the Foundation Office. A return to Auroville’s spirit and principles can still eliminate the need for court cases, and prevent the further draining of the community’s resources in terms of funds, time and morale.

11. A trusted FAMC with power to implement

You are saying: “The only (worldly) authority we have is through the Foundation, and if that disappears we are back to zero”. This sounds like a rather desperate stance i.e. “Let’s quickly change as much as we can before we lose the power”. Would it not be preferable to establish your authority on being at one with the community, the real base of Auroville, which is not changing like governments, and to place your faith in its collective wisdom and aspiration, even if these have been imperfect and slower in evolving than hoped for? Have you not felt the widespread wind of change in the community, more and more deeply aspiring for a collective re-birth into the Dream of the Divine?

12. Balancing needs – synergies and miracles

Finally, when you speak of correcting imbalances by going to the extreme other side, with “the middle-of-the-road being a very difficult place to find”, these images suggest a flat landscape with very limited options. Imagine that in this same landscape the FAMC is joined in its solo act by the community, that they put their hearts and heads together to find novel solutions, and the Divine pours its grace on to the game… Can you see the miracle of evolution bringing forth unexpected possibilities of harmony and beauty in a whole new dimension?