Exploring the history of Auroville

Many Aurovilians think that the idea for the town which would become Auroville was The Mother’s. It wasn’t. The idea came from Navajata, the General Secretary of the Sri Aurobindo Society (SAS), who brought the proposal to the Society’s first World Conference fifty years ago. On August 14, 1964, it decided “To develop a township near Pondicherry for those who want to prepare for a new life”.

Navajata’s inspiration for wanting to create this new town came from “A Dream” dated 1954, in which Mother described an ideal society. But A Dream ends, “The earth is certainly not ready to realize such an ideal, for mankind does not yet possess sufficient knowledge to understand and adopt it nor the conscious force that is indispensable in order to execute it; that is why I call it a dream.”

This changed after the Supramental descent in 1956. In a class in 1958 She said: “it is only quite recently for me that the idea of a collective reality began to appear which is not necessarily limited to the Ashram but embraces all who have declared themselves – I don’t mean materially but in their consciousness – to be disciples of Sri Aurobindo and have tried to live by his teaching. Among all of them, and more strongly since the manifestation of the supramental consciousness and form [in 1956], there has awakened the necessity of a true communal life which could not be based only on material circumstances but represent a deeper truth and be the beginning of what Sri Aurobindo has called the supramental or Gnostic community.”

Navajata had quoted these words in 1960 to explain the creation of the SAS, which happened with Mother’s support. In those days, an increasing number of disciples had moved to Pondicherry, wanting to live close to Mother. They did not join the Ashram, lived in their own houses and set up and managed their own private businesses such as Aurofood by the Patel family and New Horizon Sugar Mills by the Hindocha family. Navajata may have thought of creating a separate place, a new town, for all these people who wanted to live in Mother’s atmosphere but in less restrictive conditions than those of the Ashram – that is, without having to donate all their assets to the Ashram and having to abide by its strict rules. In fact, Mother did find it useful to have a different place for disciples who didn’t qualify as Ashramites [see in this regard Mother’s Agenda, 23.7.66, 30.3.72 and 4.4.72].

But The Mother, initially, appears to have taken little interest in this new township. She spoke to Satprem on 14 August 1964, the day this decision was taken, and then again on the 19th of August about meetings of Ashram related groups such as the SAS, but there is not a word about Auroville. The 8-page report of the conference, published in Mother India, carries only one line mentioning the decision to create a new township.

Mother’s interest seems to have started in the beginning of 1965. In its Information Letter of March 1965, the SAS informed its readers, “You will be glad to know that The Mother has taken up the model township project. She has named it ‘AUROVILLE’.” In March 1965, She wrote to Roger Anger asking him to become the architect of Her “ideal town”. In June 1965, She received two letters from Huta which, She said, awakened in Her some old dreams and formations. On 23rd June 1965, She told Satprem that until then, “I had only a secondary interest in Auroville because I had received nothing directly.” And on 21.9.66, She explained to Satprem: “… this birth of Auroville wasn’t preceded by any thought; as always, it was simply a Force acting, like a sort of absolute manifesting, and it was so strong [when the idea of Auroville presented itself to Mother] that I could have told people, “Even if you don’t believe in it, even if all circumstances appear to be quite unfavourable, I KNOW THAT AUROVILLE WILL BE. It may be in a hundred years, it may be in a thousand years, I don’t know, but Auroville will be, because it has been decreed. So it was decreed – and done quite simply, like that, in obedience to a Command, without any thought.”

Many people assume that, when She decided to take it up, Mother knew exactly what Auroville would be for, and how it would develop. This wasn’t the case. Auroville, is part of the “great adventure” of which She had spoken so passionately in 1957, when She invited “those who love adventure” to “a real adventure, whose goal is certain victory, but the road to which is unknown and must be traced out step by step in the unexplored… What will happen to you tomorrow – I have no idea. One must put aside all that has been foreseen, all that has been devised, all that has been constructed, and then... set off walking into the unknown. And – come what may!”

When researching how Auroville unfolded during the last nine years of Mother’s life (1964-1973), one sees how She was tracing step by step a road into the unknown and at times backtracked. 

City concepts and population size

In June 1965, Mother described for the first time Her “ideal town” to Satprem and then to Huta. She sketched and described Her concept – the city’s four zones with the Park of Unity at its centre and its four intermediate zones (the small petals wedged between the big petals) for public services that would not belong to Auroville. The greenbelt is not yet mentioned.

Projects which Mother had wanted to realise earlier but hadn’t materialised yet were now to come up in Auroville: the Cultural Pavilions of Her International University [see Bulletin 1952], Her Labour Colony [see Bulletin 1954], a hotel by the beach. She also repeatedly spoke of wanting the Olympic Games to be held in Auroville, of a seaport, an airport, a hydroplane station, a yacht club, etc.

Mother dreamt and encouraged Navajata, Roger and all those interested in participating, to dream of a bright future – and dream they did. And as the magnitude of the project increased dramatically, the proposed site was shifted from Usteri Lake’s east bank to the Promesse area.

On September 6th, 1965, Roger arrived in Pondicherry for the first time after his appointment as the town’s architect. The next day he presented Mother with his first report on the future town. He had many questions which She responded to and, while doing so, agreed to modify many things, such as shifting the site once again from the Promesse area to the present area. Not knowing the intended population of the town, Roger’s report spoke of 100,000 people “and even more in the future” and estimated that 50,000 persons would be accommodated within 20 years. It is at that time that Mother told him to plan for 50,000 only and that the city was to be completed in 20 years at the most. In a speech broadcast by All India Radio in November 1967, Navajata spoke of a planned population of 50,000 in the main town; 20,000-30,000 in model villages around it and 30,000 in a World Trade Centre. He is said to have read this speech beforehand to Mother and that She had approved it.

It is unlikely that the 50,000 figure include the population of the surrounding villages. The idea at that time was to integrate those willing to join Auroville but only a few families did. Some planners thought of relocating those who weren’t interested in joining. At that time, the population of these villages was perhaps 20% or 30% of what it is today.

Town models

During the next 3½ years of preparation, Roger, who was a key partner in a very successful architecture firm in Paris, visited Pondicherry five times to meet Mother. In March 1966, he presented Her with two possible models of the town – a rectangular model and the ‘Nebula’ (which was based both on the sketch She had made in front of Satprem in June 1965 and on Mother’s symbol). Mother opted for the ‘Nebula’ and wrote to Huta that it was exactly what She wanted. In August 1966, Roger returned with nine of the people who were working with him on these urban concepts and models in his Paris office.

In March/April 1967 he came very briefly to present to Mother his ‘Macro-structure’ model, even though he wasn’t satisfied with it. It is most probably during this visit that Mother finalised the position of the centre of the future town, at the crossroad of two existing pathways where a lone and beautiful banyan tree happened to stand [now the Matrimandir Banyan, eds.] During that visit Roger gave an interview in which he described the town to be. The following excerpt provides a good example of how he and others were dreaming. It also shows that, at that time, his understanding was that Auroville would be open to the world.

“The [Crown Road] – itself encircled by a hundred-metres wide canal where artificial islands will provide a rhythm, a dwelling place for various aquatic birds, where 21st century gondolas will leisurely circumnavigate – will be the intersection of all sectors, the town’s centripetal focus. This is where, in addition to the fairy-like charm of canals, the main commercial centre will be located. Here one will find theatres, sports grounds, recreation halls, gardens for meditation, forums for meetings, hotels... visitors galore, of course, since Auroville is not a closed town, but a town open to the world and town-planners must never forget this essential openness.”

Ten months later, on 21st January 1968, five weeks prior to Auroville’s Inauguration Ceremony, Roger landed in Chennai with his latest model, that of the ‘Galaxy’, which he had conceived with Charles Gianferrari and others and which had evolved from his previous models. In this ‘Galaxy’ concept, there is a sculpture of a flame in the centre (the Matrimandir was not yet conceived), and, for the first time, there is a Greenbelt surrounding the urban area. Roger is likely to have met Mother the next day and presented it to Her. She approved it, commenting that its shape existed in the cosmos. But there is no record that Mother said that this final model was Her vision.

Planning problems

One of the consequences of the third shifting of town was that it became close to the villages of Edayanachavady and Kottakarai. Roger therefore reduced the town’s diameter of the city from 3 to 2.5 kilometres. This increased its density from 7,000 inhabitants/km² to 10,000 – a 40% increase. To fit the proposed population within the now smaller city, Roger conceived of 18-storey high buildings, the so-called Lines of Force. While Roger seems to have taken this 50,000 population figure as a given and beyond discussion, we don’t know whether Mother indeed considered the 50,000 figure more important than the density Roger had earlier opted for.

Roger’s planning was also at odds with Navajata’s work of ‘selling’ housing plots. From 1964 onwards, people were invited to come to Auroville and contribute to a plot of land. Three different sizes were offered: 250, 500 and 1,000 square metres, and people were allowed to build on up to less that a third of it – on a 1,000 square metres plot, you were allowed to build a 280 square meters house per storey! Mother, in 1967, said that She had signed hundreds of these applications, and people paid up and were granted the right of possession.

But this was not what Roger envisaged. In the early 1970s, in one of the meetings of the Comité Administratif d’Auroville, Roger said he found it very difficult to plan a city accordingly with people who just bought a plot and wanted to build a house. In an interview in 1996 given to Luigi and Aryamani, Roger mentions that when, in 1976, he was taken by Navajata to see Promesse community, the then proposed site for Auroville, he was shocked because he felt that Navajata was acting like a real estate agent. Roger planned for 30 square metres for a single person and 120 square metres for a family of four – completely at odds with the house sizes permitted by Navajata and signed by Mother.

There is no information on record what Mother Herself envisaged. In 1972, Her Secretary for Auroville, Shyam Sunder Jhunjhunwala, tells Mother about the difficulty of the Tamil Nadu Land Ceiling Act which prevented the SAS from buying all the land required. Mother’s observation was, “but will everyone still have the possibility of having a garden with their house?”

In any case, these plots were never allocated to the people who had paid for them. Roger did not like the idea and did not promote it. And when, in 1980, the Auroville Emergency Provisions Act came into force, which was eight years later succeeded by the Auroville Foundation Act, these early ‘homeowners’ lost their investment.

Everything is possible

Roger’s concepts were all based on the brief given to him by Mother and on the feeling he and many others had at that time that “everything is possible”. This feeling was based on the common belief that Mother would remain in Her body; and that money, political support and securing the required land wouldn’t be problems. Brochures released at the time of the Inauguration Ceremony spoke of the need for 17,000 acres, including 1,200 for the city.

The town was expected to be built in a few decades. Mother hoped to obtain the financial support of the two ‘superpowers’ of the time, USA and USSR, and stressed that “it is only the internationalisation of Auroville that will give it its true image and dimension.” But this failed, and so did attempts to interest the World Bank and the Ford Foundation

Also an attempt to acquire all the lands with help from the Tamil Nadu government floundered. The proposal was approved by the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu, but rejected by Navajata who believed that it would take less time to buy the land by common agreement. According to Anjani, the Chief Secretary of Pondicherry who had prepared the proposal, Mother was very unhappy that Navajata had taken this decision without even referring it to Her. This shows that Mother was not involved in all decisions regarding Auroville.

Ideal city vs ideal society

The Auroville Mother described initially was a far less ideal society than the one She later spoke of. On 23.6.65, She told Satprem that Auroville was “for a slightly more ideal way of life” and that money would circulate within it “as long as human habits will be such”. On 3.6.67, Mother told Satprem that Her son, André, had written to Her from Paris that, when people asked about these conditions he was answering “Oh, that hasn’t been decided yet!” She then commented: “At least three or four hundred Aurovilians have been accepted and I signed them in. So one can’t answer like that.... I know what he based himself on: I had told him that, naturally, from the material point of view, the conditions of life in Auroville were not arbitrarily fixed in advance.” She then showed Satprem the first conditions She had drafted. “From the psychological point of view, the essential conditions are: 1) Being convinced of the essential human unity and having the will to collaborate in the advent of this unity. 2) The will to collaborate in all that furthers future realisations.” She then added: “The material conditions will be worked out as the realisation progresses.” Nine months later, with Auroville’s Charter She added as a further condition: “to be the willing servitor of the divine consciousness”. All these conditions are psychological, not material. And up to early 1969, the brochures depicted a city with all the modern facilities one could dream of, but said almost nothing about the conditions to be met to live there.

No circulation of money

Mother appears to have let things develop and see what wanted to manifest. She repeatedly affirmed that Auroville was “sure to succeed”, but did not specify what kind of Auroville it would be.

On 1st January 1969, a Consciousness descended into the earth consciousness which Mother later identified as the ‘La Conscience du Surhomme’, (literally translated as ‘the consciousness of the Overman’), the intermediate being between the present mental consciousness and the Supramental Consciousness. Perhaps because of this new Descent or simply because volunteers had started to settle in Auroville and many more were expected soon, She started enunciating principles which required a higher consciousness on the part of the Aurovilians.

One of these was Her expectation that Auroville would become the Cradle of the Superman. Another one deals with money. On 30th August 1969, She told Satprem: “Some things are beginning to come for Auroville… I would like there not to be any money within Auroville (we will see how to arrange things), that money be kept only for relations with outside.” On 25.3.70, She told him “Those who will live in Auroville won’t have money! – there’s no circulation of money.” This represented a radical policy reversal with major implications, for it meant that, within Auroville, the Aurovilians’ personal money wouldn’t provide them with access to goods and services.

It is also at the beginning of 1969 that ‘Guidelines for economic activities in Auroville’ were drafted and approved. These stipulate that “All industries should belong to Auroville from the beginning or eventually.” Mother did not want people to invest there in order to make money for themselves. (“Money is not meant to make money, money is meant to make the earth ready for the New Creation”). The adoption of these guidelines represented another radical policy reversal. Two years earlier, on 30.12.67, Mother had mentioned Aurofood Pvt. Ltd. as an example of an Auroville business, thus giving the impression that there could be private businesses in Auroville. The policy reversal resulted in Aurofood Pvt. Ltd. not becoming an Auroville business. Businesses that had already signed up for the Industrial Zone never joined.

“In Auroville I want true people”

During the last three years of Her life (1971-73), Mother often expressed Her concerns about the quality of the people who would come to join Auroville. On 9.6.71, She told Shyam Sunder: “Twelve good men would be better than hundreds of stupid persons. Auroville is not for comfort but for the servants of the Divine. People in Auroville should not shirk hard work. They should not think of escaping from the outer control until the divine control is there.” On 1.10.72: “In Auroville I do not want many men. I want some people, but true people. If you want many people, I can give you a hundred thousand in a moment from South Africa.” Three months later, Roger echoed this when he told a French journalist (J. P. Elkabash) in a televised interview: “What is important is not to build a city but to build new men”. Satprem said something similar in a 1973 interview with J. Biès: “the point is not building a city; the point is building men – this something which will turn us into really complete beings.”

Communication with the world

Another seeming reversal of policy related to how Auroville was to be communicated to the larger world. Initially, Mother hadn’t objected to Auroville being presented to UNESCO’s General Assembly, to articles being published in all sorts of newspapers and magazines all over the world, to films being made and shown to the public at large. But on 30.1.71, Mother sent to Auroville this excerpt from a letter written by Sri Aurobindo with the comment “They [the Aurovilians] all have a false idea about propaganda and publicity.”

“...I don’t believe in advertisement except for books, etc., and in propaganda except for politics and patent medicines. But for serious work it is a poison. It means either a stunt or a boom – and stunts and booms exhaust the thing they carry on their crest and leave it lifeless and broken high and dry on the shores of nowhere – or it means a movement. A movement in the case of a work like mine means the founding of a school or a sect or some other dammed nonsense. It means that hundreds or thousands of useless people join in and corrupt the work or reduce it to a pompous farce from which the Truth that was coming down recedes into secrecy and silence. It is what has happened to the ‘religions’ and it is the reason of their failure.”

When asked about the distinction She made between informing and advertising, She said: “_It is a question of mental attitude rather than of physical action. Publicity does not discriminate between the persons to whom one speaks. Publicity means addressing a public which cannot understand. What we try to do is carry the Light where it can be understood and received. It is a question of choice. It is a question of selection: not to spread the thing without discernment. It is to choose which milieu, which people, which conditions can understand and to act there only_.”

The danger of dogmas

In studying the history of Auroville, one has to remember that Mother, on various occasions, said that the level from where She ‘sees’ things is so high that people can’t follow and wrongly understand what She says. In a conversation of February 8, 1969, recorded in Mother’s Agenda, She mentions how an attempt of a disciple to properly write down what She says about Auroville failed, and warns that Her words should not become dogma. “That’s what I am afraid of: that people will make dogmas with the creation of Auroville …What I have seen here (gesture above) while … (gesture showing that it is heard at ground level) it becomes so stupid, so flat!”

Mother’s views were in constant movement as She was responding to developments. Take Bharat Nivas, the Pavilion of India, for example. When the construction was to start, the land was not yet owned by Auroville. Mother was extremely pragmatic and simply rotated the entire Master Plan. Another example is when the construction of the Matrimandir started. At the time, the land did not belong to Auroville. Roger went to see Mother to discuss the problem. She told him not to stick to mental ideas. Plans can be changed. If the Matrimandir can’t be built here, it can be built somewhere else. The lands were finally bought and Matrimandir was built at the place envisaged by Roger. But this shows how incredibly flexible Mother was. This is typically Her way of functioning: very practical, very organic, as we see when we study Her management of Ashram affairs.

Mother often would give Her blessings to a proposal, and many people believe that such blessed proposals are unchangeable. But Mother herself has on more than one occasion said that Her blessings do not mean that things will happen as desired, but that what will happen is what is best for one’s progress or the occasion. It is necessary to remember this when we make assumptions about what She did or did not want to happen concerning the development of individuals and of Auroville.