Is the Sri Aurobindo Ashram
Trust in Pondicherry bent upon destroying the spiritual legacy of Sri Aurobindo
and the Mother? If not, how do you explain the sudden reinstatement of Peter Heehs
as the head of its Archives & Research Department on the 29th of June?
Peter Heehs wrote the most
derogatory book that was ever written on Sri Aurobindo – Lives of Sri Aurobindo. His book caused such resentment among the
disciples and admirers of Sri Aurobindo that a number of cases were filed
against him and the Ashram Trust, which has been protecting him from the last eleven
years. In December 2008 the Ministry of Home Affairs took cognisance of the highly
volatile situation and directed the Orissa Govt. to conduct an investigation.
This led to the banning of the book through a Gazette notification dated 9
April 2009 which said that
“the
objectionable book contained matters
which were deliberately and
maliciously intended to insult the religious
beliefs of the devotees
of Sri Aurobindo
thereby affecting public peace and tranquility making the publication
of the objectionable book an offence punishable under Sections 295-A
and 153-A of
the Indian Penal
Code.”
(Quoted
from the Supreme Court Judgment dated 12 January 2016 in the Scheme Suit)
In this massive campaign to
defend Sri Aurobindo’s spiritual image in the public domain, lakhs of
signatures were collected by aggrieved devotees who marched in processions through
the streets of Orissa; silent dharnas were held in front of the office of the
Ashram Trust in Pondicherry; thousands of petitions and letters were written to
Manoj Das Gupta, the Managing Trustee; thousands more met him personally and
pleaded with him to “do something about it”. But all that he did in September
2008 was to request Peter Heehs to temporarily stay away from the Archives for
some time. It was this mild action taken more out of caution than as a disciplinary
measure that finally saved the Ashram Trust in the Supreme Court in a Scheme
Suit filed against it in August 2010 for breach of trust – for not being able
to protect the spiritual reputation of Sri Aurobindo who founded the Ashram in
Pondicherry.
I should also mention other notable
events: the 68 Members of Parliament who asked for clarifications on the issue
of Peter Heehs in May 2012; the consequent Enquiry in September 2012 instituted
by the Pondicherry Govt. into the financial irregularities and sexual
harassment cases of the Ashram – in August 2014 this Enquiry became a Writ Petition
filed by three lady inmates in the Supreme Court of India; the visa violations
of Peter Heehs who would have been evicted out of the country in April 2012 had
not his Leftist supporters come to his rescue; the Sri Aurobindo Society’s
unequivocal condemnation of the book around the same time, and, what is still
more amazing, the Ashram Trust’s own public notice saying that “it does not
approve” of the book.
I could continue in this
manner, but the above information is sufficient to understand the gravity of
the matter to readers who are not familiar with the issue. The Ashram Trust
should therefore seriously rethink about the dangers that may arise by the
reinstatement of Peter Heehs in its most sensitive department, which is the
repository of the spiritual treasures that Sri Aurobindo has left for posterity.
The keys of the sacred rooms have been grossly misused in 2008; do we
want them to be misused again and give Peter Heehs a second chance to write an
equally derogatory sequel to his Lives of
Sri Aurobindo ? If the Trust does not pay heed to this warning, as it is
most likely to do given the arrogance of its own position and power, then do
not blame us tomorrow for not pointing out the dangers of this reckless action well
in advance.
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