Our Ashram Belongs to Sri Aurobindo: who does not know this? ─ Kavita Singh

Now we see that there are two movements here, the first which automatically attracts the second: Heehs’s book rocking the very foundations of the Ashram with Manoj Das Gupta’s sanction to it, and the second movement of protest destabilising the Trustees.

If the Managing Trustee gives sanction to a book that intends to break the very foundations of the Ashram, he naturally draws upon himself and the other Trustees (for we don’t know why they all mysteriously follow him!) their own destabilisation.

In the field of work we have to often carry out things as instructed by those who are in charge, but our work itself, our life, our thoughts and all that we are belong to Sri Aurobindo and the Mother and nobody else. We are not subordinates to the person whose instructions we have to obey.

Therefore, though we have to carry out the instructions of the Trustees (which must be in line with what the Mother has chalked out for us), we need not obey them when that means turning our backs to our Gurus. [extract]

Our Ashram Belongs to Sri Aurobindo: 

who does not know this? 

We have come here for Sri Aurobindo and the Mother and it is their work that we do. So how can anyone take away our work just because we are fighting those who have insulted Them?

Deshpande-ji, Sudha Sinha and Radhikaranjan have been ordered by Manoj Das Gupta to stop their work. The first two who have accepted the order felt naturally offended, but perhaps they thought that there was no other choice. Radhikaranjan demanded a written notice, but Manoj Das Gupta did not give it because he knows the consequences. But does he hope to always escape by keeping quiet?

Apart from these three, there is another victim, Togo Mukherjee, who was stopped from taking food in the Dining Room. He had been taking it against payment ever since he returned from France in 1993, and was giving free physiotherapic treatment to the Ashramites and disciples as a service to the Mother.

None of the four had done any wrong. They only raised their voices against Peter’s book.

When Togo asked Manoj Das Gupta if that was the reason for stopping his food in the Dining Room, he answered that Togo was involved in an ugly movement that sought to destabilise the Trustees.

Now we see that there are two movements here, the first which automatically attracts the second: Heehs’s book rocking the very foundations of the Ashram with Manoj Das Gupta’s sanction to it, and the second movement of protest destabilising the Trustees.

If the Managing Trustee gives sanction to a book that intends to break the very foundations of the Ashram, he naturally draws upon himself and the other Trustees (for we don’t know why they all mysteriously follow him!) their own destabilisation.

In the field of work we have to often carry out things as instructed by those who are in charge, but our work itself, our life, our thoughts and all that we are belong to Sri Aurobindo and the Mother and nobody else. We are not subordinates to the person whose instructions we have to obey.

Therefore, though we have to carry out the instructions of the Trustees (which must be in line with what the Mother has chalked out for us), we need not obey them when that means turning our backs to our Gurus.

I conclude with a letter of Sri Aurobindo on this subject:

If anybody in the Ashram tries to establish a supremacy or dominating influence over others, he is in the wrong. For it is bound to be a wrong vital influence and come in the way of the Mother’s work. If you feel anything of the kind in anybody, you are quite right to resist it and throw off the influence; to accept it would be bad both for him and you….

All the work should be done under the Mother’s sole authority. All must be arranged according to her free decision. She must be free to use the capacities of each separately or together according to what is best for the work and best for the worker.

None should regard or treat another member of the Asram as his subordinate. If he is in charge, he should regard the others as his associates and helpers in the work, and he should not try to dominate or impose on them his own ideas and personal fancies, but only see to the execution of the will of the Mother. None should regard himself as a subordinate, even if he has to carry out instructions given through another or to execute under supervision the work he has to do.

All should try to work in harmony, thinking only of how best to make the work a success; personal feelings should not be allowed to interfere, for this is a most frequent cause of disturbance in the work, failure or disorder.

If you keep this truth of the work in mind and always abide by it, difficulties are likely to disappear; for others will be influenced by the rightness of your attitude and work smoothly with you. Or, if through any weakness or perversity in them, they create difficulties, the effects will fall back on them and you will feel no disturbance or trouble.

Sri Aurobindo

(Letters on the Mother, SABCL, Volume 25: pp 238-39)

Kavita Singh

(A senior sadhika who has been residing in Sri Aurobindo Ashram, Puducherry since 1949)