Auroville's monthly news magazine since 1988
Dec 2020 (58 months ago) Download PDF (free download)
A long read — Reported by Dr Karan Singh
On November 23rd, the term of office of Dr Karan Singh and the other members of the Governing Board of the Auroville Foundation came to an end. As the Board could not come to Auroville for its regular meeting due to the COVID situation, the meeting was held online, on November 7th. Dr Karan Singh, now aged 89, who has been Chairman of the Auroville Foundation for more than 15 years, addressed the Auroville residents in a video message which was screened in the Sri Aurobindo auditorium at Bharat Nivas on November 23rd. It was followed by a 20-minute video tribute to him, made by Auroville Outreach. For those who were unable to come to Bharat Nivas, a link was provided so that they could stream the videos at home in real time. Both videos are now available at https://live.auroville.org/ and at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a3_ELTcWaHE Here we publish an edited version of his address and the text of the tribute of the Auroville video.
A Q&A with Alain Bernard, Manoj Pavithran and Sathish Arumugan — In dialogue with Alan
The term ‘community’ is used in a very loose way in Auroville. Sometimes it refers to the settlement where people live, sometimes to national sub-groups, sometimes to the residents as a whole, and sometimes to an idealistic or occult aspect of Auroville. But how do Aurovilians experience community today? And is it becoming harder to do so as our numbers swell and our processes become more complex? Three Aurovilians joined us to discuss the issue. Alain Bernard is a long-term Aurovilian who, in the past, was much involved in community organization. Sathish is a member of the Residents Assembly Service (RAS), and Manoj is an administrator of Auronet and an educator involved with outreach programmes.
A long read — Reported by Vijay, Bobby Keeping, Franz, Christoph Pohl, Daniel Emden, Judith, Paul Vincent, Tim, Cecilia, Achilles, Govinda, Carel and Rolf Lieser
In the October issue of Auroville Today, we published a humorous little piece that pondered how the names of Auroville’s communities came about. We invited community members to write in and tell us how their communities were named. Here are the accounts we’ve received so far.
A long read
By the end of October, the last houses in the new community of Soffio in the Residential Zone were completed. Auroville Today spoke to architect Dorle.
A long read — Reported by Peter
Findhorn is an eco-village, a spiritual New Age community, and a well known alternative education centre in Britain. Founded by Eileen and Peter Caddy and Dorothy Maclean (who only passed away this January aged 100), the community emerged through a mixture of the spiritual guidance received by Eileen, Dorothy’s connection with the nature spirits and Peter’s physical work in grounding the guidance. Until CORONA hit, more than a hundred folk worked directly for the Foundation and over 500 lived locally, with varying degrees of relationship to the community.
A long read — Reported by Divya Lieser
Since July this year, Auroville Green Practices (AGP), a community organisation managed by Auroville Consulting, has been hosting numerous webinars, with over 1,500 people participating on more than a dozen topics, such as zero waste, upcycling, water management, vegan raw food, permaculture, and earth architecture, natural building technologies, Ferro-cement, solar energy, and many more.
A long read — Reported by Carel
In order to best determine how the lake around Matrimandir should be constructed, a large test pond is being excavated, exposing layers of earth, gravel, sand and clay. Aurovilian Geologist Gulio took interested Aurovilians on a two-hour tour of the site, illuminating the distant past.
Annapurna Farm struggles The dry summer has delayed the start of the paddy season at Annapurna, Auroville’s largest farm...
Auroville Foundation issues The term of office of the present members of the Governing Board ended on November 23rd...
Cyclone Nivar The first cyclone of the season, named ‘Nivar’, made landfall near Marakkanam, north of Auroville, in the early hours of November 26th...
Pitchandikulam Forest Newsletter Pitchandikulam Forest has issued its 2019-2020 newsletter which includes: reflective musings on the 47-year old history of Pitchandikulam Forest; the story of a monograph on the Owls of South Asia; a report on Pitchandikulam Forest’s nursery which is responsible for the growing of around 20,000 seedlings a year to help re-establish the Tropical Dry Evergreen Forest (TDEF) in Tamil Nadu; a report on the Environmental Leadership and Skill Development Programme for 350 Rural Women; the work of Pitchandikulam Forest in building water retention landscapes and the restoration of the twin lakes of Siruseri Chennai; environmental artwork for Toyota Kirloskar Motors, Bangalore, on a 25-acres ECOZONE; and creating a master plan for an Ecopark/Nature lab and teaching space for practitioners of Restoration Ecology on a piece of land near Ousteri lake...
The impact of COVID on internal transactions in Auroville A study made by Lyle on transfers made within the Financial Service between services/units and between services/units and individuals shows the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic: there were 38% less transfers in the COVID-19 months in 2019-20 than in 2018-19...
Gold award for EYER SLOW GREEN in China The Handle Climate Change Film Festival 2020 in Shenzhen, China, awarded Aurovilian Christoph Pohl the Gold Award for his film Ever Slow Green, about Auroville’s forests...
The Auroville Entry Policy 2020 / Entry & Exit Regulations / Exit Policy A decision of the Residents’ Assembly called by the Working Committee on the proposed new Entry Policy failed due to a lack of quorum (10% of adult residents)...
Aurovilians abroad can return The Government of India has agreed to cancel the suspension of all visas other than tourist visas, which means that all Aurovilians abroad who hold an Entry Visa for Auroville can now return...
Right of Way disputed Members of the Forest Group and many others Aurovilians are objecting to the partial clearing of the existing forests to allow for so-called Rights of Ways (RoWs) – three-metres wide stretches of open land to lay High Tension and other cables – along the proposed Crown road, the proposed Outer Ring Road and the proposed Radials, as has recently been advised by the Acting Secretary of the Auroville Foundation to the Town Development Council (TDC)...
New land purchases Since the start of the seventh year of Acres for Auroville, thanks to donors to Acres for Auroville and Lands For Auroville United, six new Greenbelt plots have been purchased, adding 6...
Matrimandir works Work at the Matrimandir is focused on three projects: the continuing development of the Garden of the Unexpected; the building of the foundation for a group of large quartz crystals in the Garden of Existence; and the construction of a new section of the cobblestone road encircling the Matrimandir gardens...
The Spirit of Auroville in Chinese Auro e-Books has published a bilingual English-Chinese version of the book “The Spirit of Auroville”...
Auronet Guidelines The Auroville Council has published draft guidelines for the publication of documents and views on the Auronet, the Intranet portal of Auroville...
