Issue Nº340 – News in brief

The list of 50th anniversary projects mentioned in our previous issue contains a mistake. The Walk of Hope through Auroville and the surrounding villages will take place in Auroville and the bioregion on January 28, 2018. The walk will be led by Sri M, a social activist, educator and spiritual guide who grew up in Kerala, and then spent a few years wandering through the Himalayas, in search of a higher Truth. Sri M has walked kilometers in the name of peace, in India and abroad. He has been asked to walk in Auroville and the surrounding villages as an invocation for peace, within and without.

The three Evolution Fast-Forward videos are now all freely available for streaming in their entirety online. You find them on www.sopanam.org, along with some other treasures. While the first two videos, produced by Manoj, Hemant, Arnab and their team, were made years ago, the third one, ‘Parts of the Being & Planes of Consciousness’, is new and very complete. The three Fast-Forward videos can also be ordered in a smart USB-card from Auroville.com

The Auroville Library of Things (ALoT), which has been operating for six months, is gradually developing into a useful community service. Located in a container near the Solar Kitchen, the ALoT intends to collect and lend out items that are unused by its owner.

The Education Secretary for Tamil Nadu has agreed to integrate a Garbology chapter into the Social Studies textbooks for two grades and the Garbology information boxes for grades 1-10. This means that millions of students in Tamil Nadu will learn about sustainable waste management in 2018 from the garbology programme created in Auroville.

Auroville Village Action celebrated the 21st edition of the Annual Women’s Solidarity Festival. The event was attended by over 5000 women from the bioregion, over 500 children, guests from Auroville and volunteers from the Paalam youth group in the bioregion and other village youths. The event was a great opportunity for Aurovilians to interact freely with women from the bioregion and get a glimpse of the richness of Tamil culture through celebrating the hidden talents of women from the village

The Town Development Council has informed that in view of the visit of the Prime Minister in February 2018 new roadworks will be on the way soon. These include the paving of the present earth track in front of the Visitors Centre; the replacement of worn-out pavers and the removal of all speed breakers on the road from the Visitors Center to the Kindergarten; the paving of the earth track from the Kindergarten to Solar Kitchen roundabout; and the re-dimensioning of the Solar Kitchen roundabout to fit with Indian Standards. The TDC also plans to build an entire new road - a stretch of the radial near Courage to the Solar Kitchen roundabout - to be built with poured earth concrete.

The Government of India has submitted a draft resolution for the upcoming General Conference of UNESCO. Appreciating that the Government of India passed, in 1988, the Auroville Foundation Act for the purpose of protecting and encouraging the development of Auroville; that Auroville International Centres have been established in many countries of the world; recognizing that Auroville has developed into a centre of expertise in a wide range of fields, benefiting India and noting its success in sharing its experience and helping the development of its neighboring rural population; acknowledging that Auroville is inviting all nations of the world to participate in its development, especially of its International Zone, which is designated as an educational campus hosting cultural pavilions of all nations or groups of nations, expressing the genius of each culture; noting that 28 February 2018 will mark the 50th anniversary of the founding of Auroville; and recognizing that Auroville is a successful and unique model project, proving the capacity of an international community, after almost 50 years of existence, to continue to live up to its initial founding ideas of peace and international harmony and which are also UNESCO’s own values and principles, as well as some of its major priorities, the resolution invites the Director-General of UNESCO to reinforce the association of UNESCO with Auroville and organize commemorative activities for its 50th anniversary and to re-invite the Member States on the special occasion of Auroville’s 50th anniversary, to participate in Auroville’s further development.