i TWELVE YEARS WITH SRI AUROBINDO NIRODBARAN SRI AUROBINDO ASHRAM PONDICHERRY ii Contents FOREWORD .................................................................................................................... 1 THE UNEXPECTED ........................................................................................................ 4 THE RECOVERY ........................................................................................................... 17 THE HOUSE OF THE LORD ........................................................................................ 32 THE DIVINE MOTHER “THIS IS SHE” ...................................................................... 48 WAR AND POLITICS ................................................................................................... 85 FIVE DREAMS ............................................................................................................ 116 SAVITRI ....................................................................................................................... 119 ATTENDANTS ............................................................................................................ 140 TALKS .......................................................................................................................... 157 LAUGHTER OF THE GODS ....................................................................................... 167 CORRESPONDENCE AND INTERVIEWS ................................................................ 173 GOD DEPARTS ........................................................................................................... 183 CONCLUSION ............................................................................................................. 201 POSTSCRIPT ............................................................................................................... 210 APPENDIX ................................................................................................................... 212 A MESSAGE TO AMERICA ....................................................................................... 213 MESSAGE TO THE ANDHRA UNIVERSITY ............................................................. 216 POSTSCRIPT TO THE IDEAL OF HUMAN UNITY ...................................................... 222 iii FOREWORD This book is written mainly for the disciples and devotees of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother. They have been very eager to know something about the outer life of the Master, which, because of his seclusion for many years, remained behind a veil. The Mother was not so far willing to let us lift that veil. But either because of Sri Aurobindo’s Centenary Year or for other reasons, when I proposed to write an account of our historic personal association with the Master during the last twelve years of his life, the Mother warmly a pproved of it. Not only so, she very graciously listened to the whole story. An “outsider” may find the book filled in places with devotional outpourings, miraculous phenomena and mystical overtones. But I have tried to the best of my power to give a faithful account of what I have seen and heard and what part we played in the great drama with the Master as the principal actor. Naturally, subjective impressions could not be quite left out, for it was not my purpose to draw an entirely detached description o f my experience. Yet those who are interested in having an objective picture of the most sublimely enigmatic Person of the modem age, one whom thousands have felt to be a veritable God-Man, will have, I believe, sufficient food to satisfy their seeking. For the rest, his own works are there in which to dive and gather the treasures of his supreme vision and unparalleled realisation. Nirodbaran 1 Thanks to Nirod, we have a revelation of an altogether unknown side of what Sri Aurobindo was. 2 Sri Aurobindo, 1950 3 THE UNEXPECTED It was the hour before the Gods awake The calendar stood at November 1938, the month of the Darshan. A few weeks more and we would meet the Master after a long wait of three months. After every Darshan we start counting the days for the next one, for each occasion brings the Eternal and his Shakti closer to us and is therefore a significant landmark in our lives. As the date comes nearer, our days too take on a brighter hue and the day before the Darshan, all faces glow with swe et smiles. Friends meeting on the road greet each other with one word, “Tomorrow!” or with a silent look of happy expectation. The Dining Room hums with the same theme. Wherever you go, whomsoever you meet, no other talk except the Guru’s Darshan for one or two minutes, — an eternal moment. As for myself, my feelings are more complex. I have broken verbal lances with him, challenged his views, poked fun at his Yoga. I know all these will be forgotten at the moment when I shall meet his august Presence. He will be as affable as in his letters and bestow his gracious smile from his transcendental height while my heart will beat in joy and wonder. Still, the mind cannot be entirely free from a conventional fear. In this mood of expectation we arrived at the eve of the Darshan, November 24th. The Mother gave her blessings to all in the morning. Embodiment of the Mahalakshmi Grace and Beauty, she poured her smile and filled our hearts with love and adoration, an ideal condition in which to present ourselves to the Lord. Each Darshan is an occasion for him to survey the progress we have made after the last one and to give us a fresh push towards a further advance. Visitors had swollen the even flow of our life; among them, Miss Wilson, daughter of President Wilson, had come from far-off America for the Master’s Darshan. His book Essays on the Gita had cast an unearthly spell upon her. That there could be someone who could write such a wonderful book in this materialistic age was beyond her imagination. She could h ear the Voice of the Lord saying to man, “Abandon all dharmas. Take refuge in me 4 alone. I shall deliver thee from all Sin.” The book was her Bible. She decided she must have the Darshan of such a unique person. The day passed in a happy rhythm. Most of the sadhaks had gone to bed early to prepare inwardly for the great event. Over the Ashram reigned an atmosphere of deep peace and silence. Only one light was burning in Sri Aurobindo’s corner room towards the street and keeping a vigil over the pervasive darkness. The Mother too had retired early, leaving Sri Aurobindo at his work. He was perhaps busy with Savitri now that the “avalanche of correspondence” had been arrested due to Darshan work. Thus the small hours were reached. Then in Purani’s room the light was switched on; it was 2 a.m. He had to prepare hot water for the Mother’s bath. At 7.30 a.m. the Darshan would start. But nobody suspected that Across the path of the divine Event The huge foreboding mind of Night, alone In her unlit temple of eternity, Lay stretched immobile upon Silence’ marge. Breaking the profound silence the emergency bell rang from the Mother ’s room. Purani rushed up and found the Mother at the top of the staircase. She said, “Sri Aurobindo has fallen down. Go and fetch Dr. Manilal.” Fortunately, he had come for the Darshan from Gujarat. Soon he arrived and saw that Sri Aurobindo was lying on the floor in his bedroom. On his way to the bathroom he had stumbled over a tiger skin. The doctor made a preliminary examination and suspected a fracture of the right thigh bone; he asked the Mother to send for assistants. It appears that Sri Aurobindo while passing from his sitting - room to the bathroom (probably revolving some lines of Savitri) fell with his right knee striking the head of a tiger. Perhaps there was jubilation among the adverse forces crying, “Our enemy has fallen!” Sri Aurobindo, however, remained unperturbed and tried to get up. Failing to do so he lay down quietly expecting that the Mother would come in soon. As was natural, the Mother in her turn received a strong vibration in her sleep which made her feel that something had gone wrong with Sri Aurobindo. She came in immediately and 5 found him lying on the floor. Her intuition and good general knowledge of medical science made her suspect a fracture. She rang the emergency bell. When we other doctors came up, we saw Dr. Manilal examining Sri Aurobindo’s injured leg. The Mother was sitting by Sri Aurobindo’s side, fanning him gently. I could not believe what I saw: on the one hand Sri Aurobindo lying helplessly, on the other, a deep divine sorrow on the Mother’s face. But I soon regained my composure and helped the doctor in the examination. My medical eye could not help taking in at a glance Sri Aurobindo’s entire body and appreciating the robust manly frame. His right knee was flexed, his face bore a perplexed smile as if he did not know what was wrong with him; the chest was bare, well-developed and the finely pressed snow-white dhoti drawn up contrasted with the shining golden thighs, round and marble-smooth, reminiscent of Yeats’s line, “World-famous golden-thighed Pythagoras”. A sudden fugitive vision of the Golden Purusha of the Vedas! Each gentle movement of the leg by the doctor made Sri Aurobindo let out a short “Ah!” which prompted the Mother to ask, “Is it hurting you?” Throughout the investigation he uttered very few words, only to answer the doctor’s questions. Finally the doctor pronounced that there was a fracture of the thigh bone. Sri Aurobindo simply heard the verdict and made no comment. A team of attendants was formed