1977
(Ruud Lohman, 1 January 1977:) “The New Year started with a midnight meditation under the Banyan tree with Sunil's New Year music. Since it will be the Year of the Inner Chamber I wanted to enter the New Year right there, and to my amazement I was all alone in the Inner Chamber. Sitting against the wall-section between the South ribs one sees the steel at the North-East and the pipe-structure at the North West and that gives a feeling of enclosure, as if the rest of the world is already slowly being closed out and the Inner Space defined. That's how I experience the work on the walls: as a definition of the Inner Psychic Space, of myself, of the Chamber, and of Auroville.”[1]
(Luc Venet:) “In July 1977, Satprem and I ascended the steps leading to the Central Court building in L’Ile de la Cité in Paris, in order to register the statutes of the “Institut de Recherches Evolutives”, whose purpose was to publish and distribute Mother’s Agenda worldwide. The day before, a prominent Paris attorney had confirmed that the copyrights of the Agenda were Satprem’s legal property, thus opening the way to its publication independent of the Ashram’s good offices. Several publication attempts within the Ashram had previously failed because Satprem maintained that such arrangements would jeopardize the validity and integrity of the publication.
From then on, the work of the Agenda would be in the hands of four associates of Satprem’s: Micheline, Anne, Robert, and me. A handful of other friends in France and in India would lend their occasional but enthusiastic support.”[2]
(Amrit:) “In 1976-77, two other meetings stand out in memory, one held near the French community of Aspiration. In this gathering, the focus of attention was a German Aurovilian, formerly in the Ashram, who for some reason was considered ‘polluted’ by the influence of the Ashram and not sufficiently loyal to the ‘cause’, which was beginning to show very evident signs of intolerance. He was forced to stand before the assembly, admitting and apologizing for his ‘mistakes’.
Personally appalled, even to this day, I harbor some guilt in not speaking against this dismaying display of forced ‘confession’. ...
The second meeting in August 1977 was held in Certitude itself, in the neighboring house called ‘Tapaloka’ of Kenneth and Myrtle, my to American neighbors across the wooded grove, to discuss the removal of the Jagdish group. Jagdish was a guru-like figure gathering around him a few Auroville devotees, living together in a house named ‘Fidelity’ near the Matrimandir construction site. In the meeting, there were cries of “Throw them out!” … Many stood to march to Jagdish's house to throw the group out. Joyfully acceding to mob rule in this manner – the expression on faces etched in glee – reminded me of photographs, taken in the US South, depicting Whites lynching Blacks in a virtual picnic atmosphere...
... The realization struck me that these meetings were becoming centers amplifying powerful negative energies, which impelled everyone within their ambit to insanely self-destructive actions, sweeping away all possibility of balanced judgment and psychic perception. This sudden transformation of friends and neighbors from ordinary, decent human beings into something abnormally unrecognizable was occurring before my very eyes.”[3]
(Amrit:) “In 1977, Satprem appeared in Auroville to distribute personally his first edition copies of La Mere ou Le Materialisme Divin (Mother or the Divine Materialism). Slightly skeptical of the almost god-like regard in which many Aurovilians, especially the French, viewed Satprem, I resisted immediately rushing to Aspiration where the distribution was being held. When some of the returning Aurovilians were heard comparing Satprem staring into their eyes with the power of the Mother's own personal Darshan, my own doubts were fortified. ...
Nonetheless, in my curiosity, the next day I cycled to Aspiration to take possession of a copy. In the distribution room, a letter from Satprem outlined the conditions for receiving the book. We were informed that this was a privileged gift to Auroville from Satprem, not to be shown or given to anyone outside the community, especially Ashramites – identical to the instructions regarding the Mother's Mantra provided previously by Luc Venet.
Taking my pledge as a solemn promise, I returned to my massage session with Diane, where we promptly engaged ourselves in a dispute over the pledge. Diane had, in fact, already shown the book to an Ashramite, provoking me stupidly to argue with her about the breaking of her pledge. I say stupidly, because within a very short time, the book was itself publicly published and distributed, and was available everywhere, putting a lie to the promise of keeping it secret.
...The mantra itself was also, within a short time, known all over Auroville and outside, initially causing some hard feelings between those given the mantra and those left out.”[4]
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