Sri Aurobindo

Autobiographical Notes

and Other Writings of Historical Interest

Part Two. Letters of Historical Interest

1. Letters on Personal, Practical and Political Matters (1890–1926)

Letters and Telegrams to Political and Professional Associates 1906–1926

To Motilal Roy [13]¹

5 May [1914].

Dear M –

The election is over – or what they call an election – with the result that the man who had the fewer real votes has got the majority. As for M. Richard’s votes, they got rid of them in Pondicherry and Karikal by the simple process of reading Paul Bluysen wherever Paul Richard was printed. Even where he brought his voters in Karikal to the poll himself, the results were published “Richard – 0”. At Villenur people were simply prevented from voting for him or anyone else. As for the results they had been arranged on the evening before the election by M. Gaebelé and were made to fit in with his figures. The extent to which this was done you can imagine from the fact that at Nandagopal’s village where there is no single Bluysenite, there were only 13 “votes” for Lemaire and all the rest for Bluysen. The same result in Mudrapalli which is strong for Pierre, except in one college where Sada (President of the Cercle Sportif) was interpreter and did not allow any humbug; knowing whom they had to deal with, they did not dare to falsify the results. There Bluysen got only 33 votes against 200 and more for Lemaire. In most places, this would have been the normal result, if there had been any election at all. As for Richard, he would probably have got a thousand votes beside the Chandernagore total; as in some five Colleges of Pondicherry alone he had about 300 which were transmuted into zero, and we know of one village in which he had 91 who were prevented forcibly from voting. Bluysen normally would hardly have got 5000 in the whole of French India. Of course protests are being prepared from every side, and if Bluysen is not supported by the Cabinet which is likely to come in after the elections in France, the election may be invalidated. Otherwise, for some time, he may reign in spite of the hatred and contempt of the whole population by the terror of the administration and the police. This Madrasi population is so deficient in even the rudiments of moral courage that one cannot hope very much from it.

Meanwhile Richard intends to remain in India for 2 years and work for the people. He is trying to start an Association of the young men of Pondicherry and Karikal as a sort of training ground from which men can be chosen for the Vedantic Yoga. Everything is a little nebulous as yet. I shall write to you about it when things are more definite.

Since writing the above I have received your last letter. As for the election, we must wait to see whether Bluysen is validated or not. Even if he is not, I do not think Richard can stand again until the new party in Pondicherry is increased and organised and that will have to be done quietly at first. There is, however, just one possibility, that if something happens which it is just now needless to mention, it might be feasible to unite Gaebelé and Pierre in a candidature of reconciliation. The idea was raised by Pierre himself and very reluctantly rejected by Gaebelé before the elections. Another time it might succeed and even if Richard were not the candidate chosen, he would get a great influence by engineering the settlement. Otherwise we shall have to await a more favourable opportunity. As for Bluysen he has made himself a byword for every kind of rascality and oppression, and is now the enemy much rather than Lemaire. These things we shall see to afterwards. The young men of Pondicherry and Karikal are sending a protest with signed declarations of facts observed in the election and two hundred signatures to the Minister, the Chambre and the Temps newspaper. It has also been read aloud by the President in the Commission of Recensement and produced a great impression – moral only, of course. In France, the opinion of the “jeunesse” is much valued and, joined with the Lemairiste protests, it may possibly have some effect, unless either Bluysen buys the Validation Committee or is supported by the French “hommes d’état”. There is an ugly rumour that Poincaré supports Bluysen; and there are always corrupt financial dealings underlying French politics which the outside world does not see. If so, we must put spiritual force against the banded forces of evil and see the result.

Next as to money matters. My present position is that I have exhausted all my money along with Rs 60 Richard forced on me and am still in debt for the Rs 130 due for the old rent. I do not like to take more money from Richard, for he has sold one fourth of his wife’s fortune (a very small one) in order to be able to come and work for India, and the money he has can only carry him through the 2 years he thinks of staying here. I should therefore be impoverishing them by taking anything from them. Of course, they believe that money will come whenever it is necessary; but then God’s idea of necessity and ours do not always agree. As for Rangaswamy, there is a fatality about his money,– it is intercepted by all sorts of people and very little reaches me even on the rare occasions when he sends anything. I have no hope, therefore, of any regular help from that quarter. Even in the fact of your being unable to meet him, fate has been against us. On the other hand, Saurin writes that he has been able to “fix” Rs 1000 a year for me in Bengal. Is this merely the refixing of Das’ promise or something else. As for fixing anything may be fixed orally or on paper; the difficulty is to realise what has been fixed. He says also there is Rs 500 awaiting me, my share of the garden money. He wants it for his “commerce”, but when I have no money to live on, I can hardly comply. He does not tell me what I am to do to get the money, but only that I can get it whenever I want it. I am writing to him to Meherpur, but if you see him in Calcutta, ask him to get it and send it to me at once. With this money I may be able to go on for a few months till something definite and regular can be settled and worked out. As for the sum I need monthly, so long as S and the others do not return, I need Rs 50 monthly for my own expenses + Rs 10 not for myself, but still absolutely indispensable. When S and the others return, that will no longer be sufficient. I am writing to S to try and make some real bandobast about money before coming back. Please also press Shyama Babu and the others for the money due to me. This habit of defalcation of money for “noble and philanthropic” purposes in which usually the ego is largely the beneficiary is one of the curses of our movement and , so long as it is continued, Lakshmi will not return to this country. I have sharply discontinued all looseness of the kind myself and it must be discouraged henceforth wherever we meet it. It is much better and more honest to be a thief for our own personal benefit, than under these holy masks. And always, if one must plunder, it is best to do it as a Kshatriya, not with the corruption of the Vaishya spirit of gain which is the chief enemy in our present struggle. What you have to do, is to try to make some real arrangement, not a theoretical arrangement, by which the burden of my expenses may be shifted off your shoulders until I am able to make my own provision. Meanwhile get me Rs 150 and the Rs 500 due to me (garden money) and , if afterwards we can make no other arrangement, we shall then have to consider the question again. It is this point of equipment, not only for myself but for my work in which the opposition of the Kaliyuga forces is just now the most obstinate. It has somehow to be overcome.

Richard has paid the Rs 51. I am keeping the sum as the Rs 50 for last month + 1. Please cut it off from the sum you would otherwise have sent – (not, however, from the Rs 130 for the payment of the rent). Please also get us some cloths sent from Calcutta, as they are very urgently needed, especially as I may now have to go out from time to time breaking my old rule of seclusion. I am also in need of a pair of shoes as Bharati has bagged the pair I had.

Then for more important subjects. You write about Biren being here. I do not hold the same opinion about Biren as Saurin etc do, who are inclined towards a very black interpretation of his character and actions. It seems to me that events have corroborated all he said about his relations with certain undesirable persons. Moreover I see that he has taken Yoga earnestly and has made for him a rapid progress. I am also unaware of anything he has said to others which would help any evilminded person in establishing a wrong interpretation of your philosophic and social activities. I fail to find in him, looking at him spiritually, those ineffable blacknesses which were supposed to dwell in him,– only flightiness, weakness, indiscretion, childish and erratic impulsiveness and self-will and certain undesirable possibilities present in many young Bengalis, in a certain type, indeed, which has done much harm in the past. All these have recently much diminished and I hope even to eradicate them by the Yoga. In fact, the view of his presence here forced on me by that which guides me, is that he was sent here as the representative of this type and that I have to change and purify it. If I can do this in the representative, it is possible in the future to do so in the class, and unless I can do it, the task I have set for myself for India will remain almost too difficult for solution. For as long as that element remains strong, Bengal can never become what it is intended to be.

You will say, supposing I am wrong and Saurin right, or supposing I fail. In any case, he cannot strike your work except by first striking at me, since he does not know anything about you directly or independently of his stay here. Still, there is the possibility (intellectually) of even that happening. That raises a whole question which it is necessary to settle – the entire separation of Vedantic Yoga from other activities. You must realise that my work is a very vast one and that I must in doing it, come in close contact with all sorts of people including Europeans, perhaps even officials, perhaps even spies and officials. For instance, there is Biren. There is a French man named Stair Siddhar now in Chandernagore, who came to me and whom I had to see and sound. He is a queer sort of fool with something of the knave, but he had possibilities which I had to sound. There is Richard who is to know nothing about Tantricism. There are a host of possible young men whom I must meet and handle, but who may not turn out well. It is obviously impossible for me to do this work, if the close connection with Tantriks remains and everyone whom I meet and receive is supposed by people there to be a mighty and venerable person who is to be taken at once into perfect confidence by reason of having been for a time in my august shadow. It won’t do at all. The whole thing must be rearranged on a reasonable basis.

First, it must be known among our friends that my whole action is about to be such as I have described, so that they may not again repeat that kind of mistake.

Secondly, those immediately connected with me must be aloof physically from Tantricism – because of the discredit it brings,– and intangible by evilminded persons.

Thirdly, Biren and others of that kind must be made to understand that Tantra for us is discontinued until farther notice which can be only in the far future.

Fourthly, the written basis of Vedantic Yoga has now become impossible and must be entirely changed and , as far as possible, withdrawn from circulation.

These are details, but important details. There is one matter, however, which has to be settled, that of the Brahmin. The Brahmin, it appears, has made himself impossible as an agent or, at least, he is so considered. Then as for your direct communication with Sarathi, it is looked upon with dislike by Sarathi’s people and I do not know what S’s own sentiments in the matter may be. Of course, the reason they allege is obvious enough. There is one of my own people here who might do it, but he is so useful in other important matters that I hesitate to use him as an agent in this. That is why I am in a difficulty and I get no light on the question from above, only the intellect stumbles about between possibilities against all of which there is an objection, especially from the new point of view which demands for the present a spotless peace and irreproachable reputation in these matters for the centre of Yogic activity here. Nevertheless, the thing must be done, although as the last legacy of the old state of things. I shall write to you on the old lines about it in a few days, as also about the future of the Tantric Yoga. Judging from what I have heard of the facts, I do not think the difficulty about S is likely to materialise – unless there are facts behind of which I do not know. Unfortunately the manner in which the Tantric Yoga has been carried on is so full of the old faults of former Tantric sadhana that a catastrophe was inevitable. The new Yoga cannot be used as a sort of sauce for old dishes; it must occupy the whole place on peril of serious difficulties in the siddhi and even disasters.

I shall write to you about what I propose to do about Vedantic Yoga and publication; as yet it has not been sufficiently formulated to write. At present we have only started a new society here called L’Idée Nouvelle (the New Idea) and are trying to get an authorisation.

K.

[postscript in another hand:]

Dear Moti baboo

We are in absolute want of clothes. Will you please take a little attention on that point and relieve us from this absolute want. K is going out now a days and at least for that we want some clothes.

Do not send it [in] Jogin’s name they are going back to Bengal. Send it to David.

Yours,

B.

¹ In February 1910, Sri Aurobindo left Calcutta and took temporary refuge in Chandernagore, a small French enclave on the river Hooghly about thirty kilometres north of Calcutta. There he was looked after by Motilal Roy (1882–1959), a young member of a revolutionary secret society. After leaving Chandernagore for Pondicherry in April, Sri Aurobindo kept in touch with Motilal by letter. It was primarily to Motilal that he was referring when he wrote in the “General Note on Sri Aurobindo’s Political Life” (p. 64 of this volume): “For some years he kept up some private communication with the revolutionary forces he had led through one or two individuals.” In these letters, which were subject to interception by the police, he could not of course write openly about revolutionary matters. He developed a code in which “tantra” meant revolutionary activities, and things connected with tantra (yogini chakras, tantric books, etc.) referred to revolutionary implements like guns (see Arun Chandra Dutt, ed., Light to Superlight [Calcutta: Prabartak Publishers, 1972], pp. 27–30). The code sometimes got rather complicated (see the note to letter [3] below). Sri Aurobindo did not use his normal signature or initials in the first 22 letters. Instead he signed as Kali, K., A. K. or G. He often referred to other people by initials or pseudonyms. Parthasarathi Aiyangar, for example, became “P. S.” or “the Psalmodist”.

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