Roger Anger: The Mother’s Architect—The Great Unknown by Paulette Hadnagy

From deeply within

Roger Anger. Who was he, the successful avant-garde architect who at forty-two threw his life and career at Mother’s feet? I have witnessed the incredible transformation that the avant-garde architect, living in a refurbished castle that is a jewel, underwent over the years. Roger had enjoyed life and luxury. By nature an iconoclast, he rejected pseudo-spiritual slogans and facades. But the moment the Mother stepped into his life Roger was stripped naked. By uncompromising loyalty, unfaltering faith, Roger drank his cup till the last drop and left, forever free, reabsorbed into the One of whom he had become the self-effacing servant.

For almost forty years I have been documenting Mother’s vision of the town, Matrimandir, guidelines for life in Auroville. But if the quest does not originate from deeply within, all this remains elusive; only being attuned to another reality can one start grasping the logic, and even necessity, of seemingly impossible contradictions of the challenging place that Auroville is. What I am going to write streams from within the agelong association between people taking birth every time the Avatar incarnates to help in the great adventure. Roger Anger’s adventure streams from that other reality and so is ours, if we understand the mission.

Roger’s role far exceeded that of chief architect: regarding Auroville no one was as close to the Mother as Roger. He discussed with her not only the town and the Matrimandir—but life in Auroville as well, its finance and organization, the conduct and guidelines for being an Aurovilian and whatever other issue or contingent problem might arise. If Shyam Sunder was the Mother’s secretary for Auroville affairs, Roger was her confident and spokesman, often drafting detailed documents on the most varied topics, which the Mother endorsed and circulated for implementation.

My archival research begun in 1986 as a member of the Laboratory of Evolution/Centre for Human Unity, instituted by Kireet Joshi and funded with grants from the Government of India. Six compilations on Mother’s statements and related documents on the town, Matrimandir and life in Auroville were distributed to the community along with the News and Notes. Additionally, we displayed two exhibitions with the original photographs of Roger Anger’s various layouts of Mother’s town; I had received them from Oscar, the editor of the Gazette Aurovilienne, along with his complete archive. We reintroduced Mother’s town and guidelines to the community – and Roger, who had left Auroville from 1978 to 1985, returned. “I am trying to save what can still be saved”, he commented in later years.

We were privileged to be instruments of his titanic attempt and this brought me close to Mother’s chief architect. Roger gave me astounding archival documents, never seen before, of which the crown is Mother writing to him that she always felt as the man of her project.

“I saw Mother in a burst of light… it was light utterly within light”

How did all this commence or… continued, from previous lives? Roger Anger was married to Mother’s granddaughter Françoise (Pournaprema) and started visiting the Sri Aurobindo Ashram with her from 1958 onward, year after year; the Mother would give him some small work to do. Roger recalled:

“I was fascinated by Egypt, by the relationship between the material universe, in which I lived, and that of a quest always there within me.  But unlike you, I did not have a definite spiritual commitment that worked in me; I was mainly dissatisfied with social inequalities.  Did I have a deep spiritual quest?  A curiosity and a thirst for something higher, a quest for the absolute –although objectively speaking this did not translate into a very ardent, intense inner life. … I always remained in contact with Indian thought; but this did not go very far, it never reached the heights…  Afterward I had my professional career that demanded all my time, perhaps for 10 or 15 years.  I let go of spirituality, although I always remained connected to the books of [Ramana] Maharshi, Ramakrishna and Vivekananda.”

After meeting Pournaprema—Roger continued –“I started reading books on Mother and Sri Aurobindo and this seemed a fantastic discovery.  I felt a strong shock within me in terms of inner discovery.  Those books were a great discovery.”  

“I saw Mother for the first time at the Playground, after the march past; there had been a meditation and Mother had told Françoise: “You will bring him after the meditation” to a room next to the playground. I saw Mother in a burst of light. You see, it was sublime…You entered that room with flowers on the floor, colours. It was already night, the room was lit; I remember it bathing in an orange and green light and Mother was there, dressed in white. It was light utterly within light.  It was an amazing experience. [Silence] She said two, three words; I did not say anything and she gave me some flowers.  It was a great, a grand moment. Moreover, I did not know, I had not yet realised who was she. And did I ever realise who was she in all the contacts I had with her?  It was an absolute impossibility to think, to see, to have any analysis of the intellectual type; it was purely a contact of full force.  It is a moment that cannot be erased.”

The conversation continues:

“L.: Was the first contact the most powerful one?

R.: Yes and no, because I began to realise more and more what she represented – at the level of her teaching, of her presence. One cannot say that there was not a certain level of perception that imposed itself. I saw her as a being of light that was beyond my comprehension.  I didnot understand.

L.: Did something in you feel good when you were next to her?

R.: Yes, of course; some moments were deeply moving.  It was in the evening before she returned to her room, some people would accompany her to the Ashram. We would line up and she would pass in front of us and give her blessings.  Those were absolutely unforgettable moments.  We did this every evening.  At that time, I was not seeing her; I saw her only three or four times during our stays. I know that I felt somehow intimidated, I did not know what to say to her. [Laughs] It is true.  She would ask me questions and I would reply awkwardly. [Laughs] I do not know whether she ever believed that I could make a good sadhak.

L.: I wanted to ask you, weren’t you afraid that she would ask you to become an Ashramite?

R.: I don’t believe that she ever thought of that.  I did not have that fear because I never really felt … that possibility. [Laughs]

A.: Besides that, when you returned to your life in France, did your life change?

R.: When I went back, I set myself to reading…  So, although we lived an ordinary life, our spiritual concerns were obvious.” [10 March 1996, Roger Anger in a conversation with Luigi and Aryamani, at the presence of Jacqueline.]

Quest for beauty to imagine a better society

Roger Anger had graduated at the Académie des Beaux-Arts, Paris, where the Mother also studied. This illustrious institution was created in 1795 as the merger of the Academy of Painting and Sculpture, that of Music and, lastly, that of Architecture. However, Roger’s initial vocation was painting, which he considered an integral part of architecture, along with sculpture. He said on himself:

“I have been intensely engaged in the quest for beauty.  This is absolutely certain; from a very early age I had a connection with forms, with beauty, with colour…I began very young. I wanted to be a painter…  It was above all an encounter that tended towards the absolute, towards beauty, towards the search for authentic values and an intense need, to imagine a better society; I was suffering because the society in which we lived, which was unjust, that seemed entirely hypocritical.  That was the base of my reality, without doubt. The paradox, when I said that there was a thread present in my life, it is that – in fact I have never done anything with the idea of having a successful professional career; I have never done anything for it.  I met the people I had to meet; I studied in a very good school, without wanting it. … I never did anything to try to influence the situation – nothing at all.  And when I look back at the course of my life, it is true that I am an architect because Mother willed it.  I did not want to be an architect.  It did not interest me at all.  Some people had a career because they had a calling; I simply wanted to paint and then to study medicine. … [Ibid.]

Seeking to manifest an ever-elusive reality via the medium of sculptural architecture makes of Anger a precursor of the major contemporary trends. This was my discovery, when I started displaying exhibitions from Suprematism and Brutalism to Post Modernism to Deconstruction to Hi Tech and, finally, the sinuous architecture of Zaha Hadid, where buildings dissolve into sublime sculptural forms, often computer generated, and whose material realisation is made possible by a super-team of engineers acquainted with the latest software possibilities.

It is this—the capacity of vision, of numinous seeing, Roger’s mediumistic insights, his building flamboyant, ante litteram creations—that made Roger precious in Mother’s eyes and the chosen instrument to capture her vision. Kireet Joshi reports, in his tribute to Roger at his passing:

“They want to go to U.S.A. for studying architecture, when the greatest architect of the world is here.”This was the comment of the Mother in late 60’s, when a student of the Ashram Centre of Education wrote to Her that he wanted to go to U.S.A. for studying architecture. “The greatest architect of the world” was the phrase used by the Mother to refer to Roger. This architect from France had earlier visited Chandigarh; and was disappointed, since the concept, design and architectural pattern of that great city of India did not come up to his own standards of aesthetic taste and sensitivity. He had spoken of this to the Mother. Hence, when the idea of building up an international township of Auroville began to be conceived by the Mother, a letter was written by Her from the Ashram at Pondicherry to Roger, who was at that time in France, asking him if he would like to build up Auroville as its architect. When Roger answered the letter in the affirmative, the Mother was greatly pleased, and when She wrote to him in appreciation of his positive response, the Mother commented that his response was not a surprise to Her, because She had already known him as the “Man of the Project”!”

The mutual belief of working with matter in the fourth dimension, the boldness of participating in an endless adventure that denies the impossible: this was the meeting point between the Divine Mother and her chief-architect—the common language they spoke, heralding the advent of a new world and society. Architecture and engineering, today, go hand-in-hand with the most sophisticated know-how. The architects often fulfil multiple roles – from artists to engineers to town-planners, to sociologists and philosophers and visioners. Often, they are social innovators, at the borderline with utopia and the metaphysical quest; many of their prestigious creations are born at the end of a long, fruitful life. Unless we acknowledge this axiom and, along with it, Roger Anger’s role of precursor, which made of him the chief-architect the Mother chose, the reasons for the Shakti’s choice keep eluding us.

Achievements before being appointed by the Mother

Ranking amongst the French avant-garde architects reacting to post-war architecture, in his native country Roger is considered having contributed to shape today’s architecture. A well-known architect who between the fifties and the early seventies had already executed dozens of large-scale, prestigious projects in affluent neighbourhoods of Paris and other French towns before being assigned the Auroville task, sometimes Anger gathered two or three buildings in a row, with variations particular to each building and even to the building itself. Each of his creations bore a markedly avant-garde imprint, particularly regarding the search for ‘individualizing collective housing’ which distinguished his architectural achievements. Interacting with the construction material of that age—concrete—as if it was sculptural matter, Roger Anger introduced rhythm and inventiveness, experimenting with all sort of materials; sometimes he alternated concrete and wooden panels, displaying multiple patterns deliberately at clash with each other, in the same building or complex, in a kaleidoscope of forms and colours; occasionally, de-fragmenting the façade into multiple layers playfully independent from each other. His first work was a staircase, entirely made of glass, heralding the work of Eva Jiricna, an architect whose fame is due to her spectacular glass staircases.

Passing from the rigorous, ascetic elegance displayed in some facades, to the dynamic repetition of motives or geometric patterns streaming from each other in endless succession, he introduced a new language that stressed the need for creative individuality, acknowledging the uniqueness of each human being—versus the uniformity and anonymity, cage-like, of the prevailing trends of the time. Even a large building destined to the less affluent classes bore the typically dynamic imprint of Roger Anger.

The architect Anupama Kundoo, closely associated during his last years, observed that “The Paris Guide to Modern Architecture mentions seven of his projects as worth visiting. …  His buildings were recognized as distinct in their rhythmic facades made of elements of the proportions of an individual house that were at the same time sculptural and playful. ‘Simple in conception but complex in treatment’ is how his approach had been summarized. His work was also characterized by the integration of elements of modern art and abstract ornamental art as an integral part of the architecture…” [“Roger Anger: Research on Beauty” by Anupama Kundoo]

She further commented: “The aim of architecture was to manifest a high standard of beauty, he said, “Beauty has the power of uplifting the consciousness, spontaneously…” … For me, he has been an intriguingly rare personality who could maintain the widest of vision and simultaneously pay attention to the smallest of details. A refined and heroic being, straightforward and courageous, who led a disciplined balanced life, and rarely skipped his afternoon game of chess, “it’s one game, where nothing can occur by chance, you create everything. [Ibid.]

Significantly, for eight years Roger Anger was in the editorial board of “L’ Architectured’ Ajourd’ hui”—France’s leading magazine in the field of architecture, largely contributing to the education of old and new generations of architects, designers and town planners. His avant-garde approach to residential complexes and high-rise buildings; his plastic sense; the capacity to gather around himself a large team of capable collaborators (not just architects, but engineers, designers, mosaicists, draughtsman, artists and craftsmen etc.) stretching to domains complementary to that of architecture—all this had won him quite a reputation. It is relevant to note that, when the major of Paris called for a competition for a railway station (the Gare d’ Orsay), out of the four architects he invited one was Le Corbusier—and another, Roger Anger.

Of all the buildings of the French period the Three Towers of Grenoble [1], as they are popularly known—at that time the tallest residential buildings of Europe, realized in collaboration with the architect Pierre Puccinelli—are the most outstanding example of Anger’s quest. Significantly, the southern town of Grenoble, the largest human agglomeration at the Alps’ feet hosting— among others—over 55,000 students dedicated to research on advanced technology, was a cauldron of avant-garde movements. The project was selected by the Commission Supérieure de l’ Architecture: the supreme organ, in France, deciding upon the major national projects. These excerpts from Roger Anger’s presentation, downloaded from the much detailed Three Towers’ website, herald the concept of the green, vertical, compact eco-city that, today, is one hallmark of latest architecture and town planning:

“Everything was born, he said, in a most simple way. Since long time the municipality of Grenoble wished to build on the Green Island. A plan had been made foreseeing three towers. The reason for this was the need to respect the green spaces. The Green Island is in fact a park, at the edge of the town, located on an ancient bed of the Isère River, where a fort stood until yesterday. It [the island] was covered by splendid trees. Had we built dwellings, at ground floor’s level, in a number equivalent to those foreseen, the park would have entirely disappeared. In terms of urbanism, the tower solution offered the advantage of reaching a higher density while using a minimum amount of ground-space. We did about forty sketches to determine what form would occupy the least space. At last we opted for the diamond, or rather two triangles placed side by side, truncated and separated by a rift, a central chimney whose two ends open outside, and where are located the building’s common spaces. The concept did require 55,000 working hours by architects, drawers and engineers.”

Why such a form one may ask. Here is Anger’s reply:

“First of all because of the orientation. We have proceeded in such a way that no apartment is North-oriented. And then, this corresponded to our aspirations. In our studies we have always reacted to the curtain-walls.” “At first sight it is difficult to imagine a tower that does not correspond to the traditional plastic image. After all, a tower is something very simple. It is dumpy, massif, square. But us, we wish to realize something subtler, more elegant.

Something whose aspect changes according to the angle from which we look at. We also wished to include our architectural research consisting in giving to each flat a personality of its own, and to each inhabitant a sense of freedom. Each flat, here, has its own loggia. It is independent from its neighbors. No one can view another’s [space]. [It is like] realizing in height a suite of individual houses. Building small particular hotels on top of each other. Grenoble’s Towers are an attempt in this sense.”

The Three Towers were commenced in 1963 and completed in 1967,just in time for the Winter Olympics; these concluded on 18 February 1968, ten days before Auroville Foundation Day. The architects Anger and Puccinelli were awarded the Architecture First International Prize, Brussels; the Towers were successively declared national heritage site. In the light of such chronology, this complex is of a particular significance to help understand what the Mother meant when, on 30 March 1965, she wrote to Roger Anger that she always felt him as the man for her project of an ideal town.

Roger Anger has received awards such as:

¨Prize La Beauté de Paris, Ile de France.

¨Prize L’Académied’Architecture, silver medal.

¨Prize La Ville de Paris, silver medal.

¨Architecture First International Prize, Brussels, for the Towers of Grenoble (Ile Verte), 1967.

¨Grand Prix National de l’ Architecture, 2023.

“The embryo or seed of the future supramental world” 

In “Records of Yoga”, in 1913-1914 Sri Aurobindo had repeated visions of a city and a new society: “city of the ideality”, “vision of the city on the hill”, “collective city vision again occurred after a long period”, “the society of the Satya yuga then rightly begins”, “for some time, the spirit of the ideal society seems in a crude form to be growing among a certain number”. The Mother had been dreaming of a special creation since an early age. Her vision of Auroville is the ever-existing City ready to manifest, the ‘City of God’ Sri Aurobindo refers to in “The Life Divine”. In 1930 she saw it as “the Avatar’s model town” and wrote:

“The work of achieving a continuity which permits one to go up and down and bring into the material what is above, is done inside the consciousness. He who is meant to do it, the Avatar, even if he were shut up in a prison and saw nobody and never moved out, still would he do the work, because it is a work in the consciousness, a work of connection between the Supermind and the material being. He does not need to be recognised, he needs have no outward power in order to be able to establish this conscious connection. Once, however, the connection is made, it must have its effect in the outward world in the form of a new creation, beginning with a model town and ending with a perfect world.” [Collected Works of the Mother, Volume 3, pp. 178-179]

Could a Beaux Arts architect translate into matter Mother’s vision that, in its essence, is the cradle of the superman, as she unveiled in 1966? Has the moment come for the Truth-Force of the supramental consciousness to manifest, halting the race to self-destruction that can blow up the planet at any moment—and with it, millennia of civilization—by creating a model town where within is without, and whose ultimate purpose is the birth of the supramental society of Gnostic Beings?

As Sri Aurobindo wrote in “The Human Cycle”, all fields of human knowledge and disciplines are influenced by the new consciousness piercing through. This is particularly evident in the most advanced trends of architecture and engineering; when Kireet Joshi visited my first Hi-Tech exhibition, he noted down: “In every building I see the Supermind”. The task awaiting Roger Anger was to come up with blueprints that are the material representation of the manifesting new consciousness: making the transition from the objective to the subjective age, while paving the way for the realization on earth of the Supermind. The physical dimension of the town, named after Sri Aurobindo, was to express this turning point by the force of visionary architecture and daring engineering, blending together to turn matter into a vehicle of the descending force.

Fully aware of who was he, the Mother asked Roger to build her town. On 24 March 1965, Roger’s forty-second birthday, he wrote that he accepted her offer. She replied: “…It is with a real joy that I read your letter of the 24th replying to my project of an ‘ideal town’. With joy, but also with no surprise, as I always felt you as the man for this project…”Even the envelope the Mother wrote! In the night preceding a crucial event Roger, accompanied by Jacqueline, gave me a copy of the original letter and envelope with Mother’s handwriting; Nirobdaran, “Savitri”s scribe, asked me to read it aloud, in French and in English, at the exhibition on Mother’s town and Matrimandir that I displayed at the Ashram’s Exhibition Hall around 24 April 2003, for the darshan festivity. Since the breakup with the Society, this was the first and only official exhibition by Auroville, commissioned by the Chairman of the Governing Board, Kireet Joshi, and hosted afterward by the Sri Aurobindo Ashram. It was a solemn moment of re-consecration. The Mother was present throughout.

“Mother told me clearly that in architecture we have to do as Roger says”

The Mother did not ask Roger to relinquish his practice in Paris; materialising her town requested a highly professional team like the one Roger had, ensuring the outstanding quality of his creations. Like him, his colleagues too served Auroville for free, and Roger kept paying models, albums and whatever material was needed. To supply funds to Auroville’s hailing finances, he also accepted assignments from some Indian towns: Salem, Kudremukh, Faridabad; engineer Pashi Kapur was the manager. Introducing himself, Roger explained:

“The universal nature of Auroville calls for the meeting of different trends of architectural creation in order that the city may become a true planetary achievement. […] Like any French architect I studied at the “Beaux Arts”. Very soon I had the opportunity to build a good number of spectacular projects. In France I am considered as belonging not to a revolutionary, but to an ‘avant-garde’ architectural trend. At the beginning of my career, I was very much concerned with the renewal of form, with an architecture very strongly centered around the study of space. For a certain number of years, now, I have been led to devote myself to an architecture concerned with man viewed as a social being and to conceive of a kind of architecture with which man would actually merge. The group of architects I am working with is studying pan-social architectural forms. They constitute a preview of the flexible type of architecture necessary for Auroville’s first modules and could meet the dynamic imperatives of its construction over the years. Inevitably, I became more and more interested in the principles of urbanism and have utilized them for Auroville’s successive layouts and, even more so, in the latest model of the town.” [Excerpt from ‘Interview with the Chief Architect Roger Anger’, in Journal of the Indian Institute of Architects, Bombay, April-June 1971. This was an updated version of an early interview published in the Auroville magazine“=1”, referring to the yin-yang 1967 model, on whose postcard the Mother wrote “The town of the future”. This featured, among others, two macrostructures, a monorail, and many water-bodies.]

On June 23, l965, unveiling her general concept of the town, the Mother told Satprem:““Now I have my general plan; I am waiting for R. to make the detailed plans because since the beginning I have said, “R. will be the architect,” and I have written to R. … So I wrote to him, “If you want, I have a city to build.” He is so very glad, he is coming. And when he comes, I’ll show him my plan, then he will build the city.””

Shyam Sunder, to whom the Mother had “entrusted the responsibility of Auroville” (handwritten statement, 8 February 1973), daily met the Mother, who minutely instructed him. The following excerpts from “Down the Memory Lane” (Shyam Sunder’s notes about his years serving the Mother, pp.70-1) shed light on how the Mother related to Roger:

“I heard of Roger Anger the day Mother spoke to Navajata about him in connection with Auroville. That was when the Auroville idea was just getting known. An offer was received from him in his firm’s name for the architectural services to be rendered by him to Auroville.‘I am giving you a costly architect,’ Mother said to Navajata when she gave him the paper of offer, and asked him, ‘Are you willing?’ With his characteristic enthusiasm Navajata had expressed his readiness and given me the offer for comments. It was the usual commercial type of offer and needed a lot of finance. When I told Navajata that he was incurring a big liability by signing his acceptance, he hoped that in the course of Mother’s working the offer and its acceptance would be forgotten and money for Roger’s services will not be needed. That is how it happened later. Roger would not only render his architectural services without any honorarium, he would spend from his own pocket for it. …

Mother told me clearly that in architecture we have to do as Roger says. I have always adhered to it, whether I agreed with him or not, and this has brought upon me the displeasure of other architects who have different tastes. Once Mother told me, ‘What you are saying is right; what Roger is saying is also right. Do as he says.’  I do not exactly remember the occasion of it, but I do remember that for the sake of harmonization, Mother expected me to get over my conceptions of being right.”

Below are a few more excerpts, confirming Mother’s full trust in Roger:

“Mother says she is in agreement with Roger’s plan. The Auroville constructions should be in accordance with his plan. She also asked, “Is it that those who are already there do not wish to come in the community constructions?” (23.3.71)

“I asked Mother, ‘28 February is the anniversary of Auroville. What programme should we have that day?’

“Has Roger made any programme?” (23.2.72)

“I spoke to Mother about Roger’s letter to me and Mother’s approval for the soap industry in the industrial zone of Auroville.

Mother confirmed it, also the fact that Roger is in charge of the architecture in Auroville. She laid stress on harmony. …

In the evening I informed Mother that I have asked the soap industry man not to construct at Aurogarage and that when Roger comes she can reassure him that he is the only person responsible for the Auroville architecture and its execution.” (1.6.72)

“[Replying to Shanti’s letter, point III reads as:]

III. Roger is the architect. If anyone is not willing to use what he makes, there will be others to use it.” (11.2.73)

The Mother stressed the choice of Roger as the architect to whom she had entrusted the construction of the town and its soul-centre also in letters to Huta: 

Meanwhile it is not to Nava that I shall show the letter but to the architect of Auroville when he arrives and see with him the way of giving concrete realization to the beautiful plans. (20.6.65)

I will explain to you more when I have spoken to the architect who will be coming in September… (25.6.65)

Roger has just arrived yesterday. I am seeing him this morning to explain to him the plan of Auroville.  The central park will be the park of Unity containing the Pavilion and its ‘annexe’ [Huta’s house] as formerly decided. (7.9.65)

Child, Roger is coming on the 7th and I am going to see him on the 8th.  I shall tell you all about the plan when you come on the 10th. (3.4.66)

At the end of March, when Roger will come, the final plan [of Matrimandir] will be made. (14.2.69)

The Mother made clear that Roger was the architect of her own choice; it was between the two of them, no one was to interfere. She had to defend her architect right away, all the time. These two letters to Huta, on 24 July and 15 October l965—three years before Auroville was founded—are highly significant: 

“What you have just written is news to me – I know nothing about it.

I told you already that I am waiting for the architect of Auroville who is coming at the beginning of September and we shall do together the plan of the town. I shall explain to him what I want and thing will be done accordingly.

Nobody else has any saying in the matter. If sincerely you want to know the Truth, you must first abstain from believing all the stories that people tell you, not always with a very harmonious intention.” [Huta, The Spirit of Auroville, p. 27]

“It is Roger who will lay the first stone of the Pavilion[the future Matrimandir], in front of a few people (one of each country) and you will be there.

Roger will come back in February or March of next year l966; so the ceremony cannot take place before that.  …

Once more, I warn you not to listen to what people tell you, whoever they are, about Auroville, because nobody except me knows the exact thing. If you want to know something about Auroville, ask me, and nobody else and about the Pavilion I will certainly let you informed on all happenings.” [Ibid., p. 28]

Rivalries and jealousies were rampant as soon as the Mother chose Roger. “Nobody else has any saying in the matter”: the Mother made this clear to everybody, dismissing on the spot all attacks to Roger. No wonder that the attempts to demolish him by all means gained momentum as soon as the Mother left the body! On 12 March 1974 André Morisset, Mother’s only son, wrote to Huta about Matrimandir:

“Of the plans for the building itself she [the Mother] never spoke to me, so that I understood it was a matter between her, Roger and Shyam Sunder, and I never asked a question. Usually she saw Roger after me, but I clearly remember the instance when Roger and Gabriel explained to her what could be done for the flame. In spite of the importance of the decision and the interest she had in it, she did not utter a word to me.” [Ibid., p. 179-180]

Attacked at the Ashram by Huta (pretending that the Mother was stuck with the 1965 ‘Pavilion of Love’, pagoda-like) and Patrizia Norelli (the Chamber’s dimensions), in August 1974 Roger issued a statement, marked “Only for the information of Aurovilians”, explaining his “decision to withdraw from the existing system of organization and administration of the township”.

On 5 September 1974 André wrote to Huta:

“Concerning his [Roger’s] ‘resignation’ I have pointed out that it is not in his power to get rid of the responsibility which Mother has placed in him.”[Ibid., p. 211]

In Auroville, Divakar tried to involve Satprem in the polemic started by the astrologer Patrizia Norelli. Satprem’s reply on 13 September 1974 concludes so: 

“…As far as I know, Mother has always considered Roger as the architect and the person responsible for the work. Consequently, it is by coming to an understanding with him that it should be possible to rectify the “errors”, if any. If each one of the eminent persons attending to matters in Auroville wants to add his idea or his interpretation or his particular truth, we shall get a Matrimandir with lumps, even if these lumps have ostensibly been inspired by the Mother.I do know what Mother told me, but I am not going to shout: <Mother said, Mother said…> — I refer to Roger. There are no contradictions in Mother, but many in our consciousness.”

A cultural, international township of 50,000 inhabitants

The Mother told Satprem that in the thirties she had conceived of a first Auroville, a much larger settlement than the present one; she asked Antonin Raymond, the architect of iconic Golconde (the first modernist building in India) to draw a plan for a city-country in the shape of her symbol. Sri Aurobindo’s house stood at the centre, on top of a hill; a large river flowed below. The gated city, meant to be economically self-sufficient, hosted farms and industries outside its walls. Alas, the Nizam of Hyderabad died and this was the end of the matter. The formation of “an ideal city, the nucleus of a small ideal country … the embryo or seed of the future supramental world” resurfaced in l961; also walled, it was secluded, in the Himalayas. At last, at the First World Conference on human unity from 10 to 15 August 1964, held by the Sri Aurobindo Society in its premises, over four hundred delegates from all over India and other countries received the announcement of a new cultural, international township, to be built at the outskirts of Pondicherry, for people preparing for a new life.

How did the figure of 50,000 (reproduced in all reports, pamphlets and brochures) come about? On 7 September 1965Roger Anger had submitted to the Mother his first report. This cardinal document contains the seminal principles of Mother’s town; significantly, it was the first document that Roger ever passed to me, I translated it into English. The Mother wrote several major comments on it. The dwellings were scheduled to be 40,000 in number, and the figure of 100,000 inhabitants and more, to be achieved within a span of 30-40 years, appears twice. Excerpt: “We shouldn’t underestimate the influences of all sorts that will exert the creation of a new town, whose population is estimated at 10,000 inhabitants at its beginning, and which before thirty years may reach 100,000, and in the future even more.”.

In “A Glimpse of Mother’s Love and Action”, published by the Sri Aurobindo Society in 1997, Vijay Poddar reported:

“In 1966 the first plans and models of Auroville were brought by the architects [Roger and associates] for showing to the Mother [on March 9, 1966]. Mother was very happy and directed that an exhibition should be arranged where all would be able to see them. On this occasion a special brochure, the first one on Auroville, was printed for sending to UNESCO. The Mother wrote a paragraph for it, which brought out in a nutshell the role of the Mother and her purpose in creating the Sri Aurobindo Ashram and Auroville.”

That brochure, presented to UNESCO’s General Assembly in November 1966, sheds light upon both figures, 50,000 and 100,000—as well as on the model villages that should manifest along with the town.

“The population has been deliberately fixed at 50,000 inhabitants. This limit permits the adoption of a concentric plan of urbanization, which in a town of continuous expansion would not be practicable. But in the case of Auroville the inherent advantage of a circular plan finds full justification in thereby accentuating the symbolic character of the town. The axes of penetration towards the centre create a convergence, a densification of buildings, increasing to a point where they suddenly open out upon the gardens of Unity. In the centre of these gardens, surrounded by a lake, will be situated “The Sanctuary of Truth”, and the Matrimandir, (Shrine of the Mother). … Each zone will occupy an equal position and importance in relation to the spiritual centre of the town, which will dominate the architectural ensemble and will be a constant reminder of the ‘raison d’être’ of Auroville.”

Featured are elements of a particular importance, showing that from the beginning the Mother had approved in its entirety the overall concept of Matrimandir and the surrounding area, also in relationship to the city. In particular:

a) the circular plan, “accentuating the symbolic character of the town”.

b) the densification of buildings, suddenly opening out upon ‘the gardens of Unity’, at whose centre, surrounded by a lake, is the “Sanctuary of Truth”(the future Matrimandir).

c) “The spiritual centre of the town … will dominate the architectural ensemble and will be a constant reminder of the ‘raison d’être’ of Auroville.”

The talk given to All India Radio by Navajata (the Secretary to the Sri Aurobindo Society) on 11 November 1967 further clarifies these figures. The Mother had approved the text:

“Provision is made for 50,000 residents in the main town, 20,000 in model villages in its green belt, and 30,000 in its subsidiary projects like World Trade Centre etc. … Architects and engineers from different countries have volunteered their service free. Mr. Roger Anger of France is the Chief Architect. … Permanent cultural pavilions for each country and also for each State of India are an important feature of Auroville activities. …”

In 1996 Roger Anger summed it up:

“A.: Was Mother already speaking of 50,000 inhabitants?

R.: Oh yes.  From the inception, when I started to have talks with her, she fixed the number at 50,000.  I think it was number required for the experiment to have complete reality.

L.: Was it because of a suggestion from you or from her own initiative?

R.: No, I think it came after a discussion about the number of inhabitants. I believe that she gave a figure.  We fixed it at 50,000.  It was close to what she wanted or to what she told me; I don’t remember very well how it happened.  Fifty thousand, it had always been 50,000. Personally, I don’t know why I would have given a number.  If she had told me 10,000, I would have put 10,000; 20,000 I would have taken 20,000.  In 1968 it was quite…  It was a number that was far from being uninteresting in terms of environment, in terms of densification of cities. … Because beyond that, one loses the feeling of a small town and enters into that of a mega-city.  At 50,000 you still have contact with people and visually you are still able to associate urbanisation to something one is used to.” [10 March 1996, Roger Anger conversation.]

In 1966 Roger presented to the Mother the ‘Nebula’ model, and in 1967 the ‘Macrostructure/Yin-Yang’ model. Both had a 1.5km radius. However, in January 1968 the centre of the town was shifted of 250meters,closer to the villages of Edayanchavadi and Kottakarai—and the radius was reduced to 1.25km. Either the planned population decreased, or the density increased; the second option prevailed.

Vision in manifestation: from the ‘Nebula’, to the ‘Macrostructures/Ying-Yang layout’, to the ‘Galaxy’

Between 1966 and 1968 the Mother approved the three layouts that Roger submitted, worked out with his team in Paris. All three shared these essential tenets: the circular plan; the four zones divided by parks; the service/crown road; the [future] Matrimandir as the spiritual centre of the town, with its lake and gardens.

Evolving out of each other, at the origin was the sketch the Mother drew in front of Huta, on 25 June 1965, explaining her the general concept; two days earlier the Mother had given to Satprem a much detailed description. Roger recalled:“As I did not know exactly what [Mother] wanted – whether it was a city open to the world, or an inward-looking city, like a protected fortress of spirituality, we came up with two projects, two concepts.  Two teams worked separately and so I came with two projects. She chose immediately.  She said “it is the open city”. She was very clear about it; there was no need to discuss it.  “You understood what I wanted.  It is perfect.”  We were very happy.” [10 March 1996, Roger Anger conversation.]

Had the Mother prioritised an easy solution, the squarish rectangle based on the traditional grid pattern would have been the choice. Instead, this is the only plan she discarded—without even opening the album, Roger told me while showing it to me. It featured astounding buildings.

Roger had submitted the dismissed plan along with the first circular plan, which favoured a concentric and symbolical urbanism; the road network echoed Mother’s symbol and there were sculptural hints. Recognising her early formation in the thirties, the Mother saw it as a nebula and the next day wrote to Huta: “Yesterday, I saw only the plans and models of the town that are simply wonderful, just as I wanted them to be”. On 23 April 1966 the Mother showed to Satprem a new brochure commenting: “The photos are very pretty.  One is quite like a nebula.  […] The city already exists.  And the remarkable thing is that I simply told Roger the broad outlines, asking him if he was interested.  Then he went back to France and he received my formation (my old formation [based on my symbol], which I myself had left asleep); he received it there.  I found that very interesting.  He received it, he said to me, ‘It came all at once, I seemed to be possessed by something, and in one night the whole thing was done.’”

But the Nebula, archetypal, hieratic, echoing the ideal cities of the Renaissance, looked static. In Roger’s words:“These plans [‘Rectangular’ and ‘Nebula’] were only ideas, sketches; then we worked on the chosen project to try to improve it because it looked a bit static.  It took another one and half year at least— two years.  I brought more projects to Mother the following year, six months later, I don’t remember. I brought her another project which was interesting – which started to be a little more dynamic; which was spinning a little. Like [a] Yin and Yang [symbol] with two energies.” [10 March 1996, Roger Anger conversation.]

The new plan revolved around two enormous horizontal buildings, curvilinear,of ascending/descending heights, hosting most of the 50,000 inhabitants. In the sixties, utopia had taken the form of macrostructures, popularized by the phantasmagorical plans of the Italian architect Paolo Soleri, the founder of Arcosanti; he visited Auroville. That intermediary model, known as the “Macro Model” or “Yin-Yang Model”, paving the way to the ‘Galaxy’, was endowed with a supra-elevated circular monorail for speed traffic and many water bodies. Endorsing the macrostructures layout, the Mother made to print postcards with her handwritten comment, in French and in English: “Auroville la cite’ du futur”, “Auroville the town of the future”. The Ashram’s “Bulletin of Physical Education”, issued on 24 November 1967 to celebrate Sri Aurobindo’s Siddhi Day, published the two images with Mother’s handwriting. Postcards were still in use on Auroville Foundation Day, along with those of the ‘Galaxy’, to be mailed with a celebratory stamp issued by the Government of India.

David Nightingale, the Aurovilian architect who co-founded the Dream catchers, in the Auroville website commented about this second layout:

“Roger was very much at the leading edge in seeing the need to both reduce our collective built footprint on the earth, as well as integrating the latest technological solutions for energy generation and building construction. The road layout has also become more dynamic than in the ‘Nebula Model’, but it still plays a dominant part in the overall impression and defines the outer edge of the town. So was this the elusive plan that Mother was calling for? It seems not—and when one sees the huge number of wonderful sketches Roger made whilst trying to ‘discover’ what Mother was calling for, I continue to be amazed by his tenacity and degree of inventiveness. As a starting point the ‘Macro Model’ ticked all the boxes – futuristic, complex, radical and inventive – and yet still it wasn’t enough and somehow they both knew it…until just before the inauguration in 1968 he returned with the ‘Galaxy Model’, at which point it seems that they both realised that their collaboration had finally borne fruit!”

Answering to Luigi and Aryamani, Roger explained the transition from the Macro/Yin-Yang Model to the Galaxy:

L.: The beginning of the Galaxy, but with two long lines of force.

R.: Like Yin and Yang, there were two energies.

L.: Two lines of force which hid the view of Matrimandir—the view of the centre.

R.: It hid it without hiding it; but it enclosed the Matrimandir in a kind of valley with buildings around it which locked it in somewhat.  It was interesting but it was a mega-structure. It was extremely theoretical but what was interesting was that the beginning of the Galaxy was there.  So, I showed it to Mother.  I must say that I felt it was not up to the mark when I showed it to her.  She did not say anything… She said it was interesting but I could feel that it had not reached its potential.  I also felt it had established something but that it wasn’t entirely there as yet.  So the whole team worked on it again.  It took another six months – one year – rather six months.  I worked on it at Théméricourt, an estate I had in the countryside.  We withdrew for months and worked on project number two.  I worked a lot with Charles Gianferrari. … We made an incredible number of models; I don’t know how many… it moved little by little; it ventured forward.  And then one day we took the concept and we cut lines in it—the famous lines of force—and we said that in fact it pertained to a matter of functioning; to a question of density.  We couldn’t find enough space to locate all the inhabitants—it was quite difficult in terms of density.  The circulation was not good.  So, it made a lot of problems.”

A.: So, you were saying that you had reached a point with this team of finding the lines of force.

R.: Yes, we came up with the Galaxy concept.  Then it was only a question of working things out.  We made two models, we thought about the type of buildings.  After that everything flowed smoothly.  When something comes like that, naturally, it is a good sign.  There was nothing to discuss.  We knew that we had come upon the answer.  We knew that we had come into contact with something that was the essence.  I went back [to India] with a model which was the small model at that time—and I came to see Mother—and Mother found it….  This time it was accomplished.  …

Yes, it is then that the city was born.  Moreover, I don’t think she was surprised.  I don’t think that she was astonished by the Galaxy, to her it was what was to be achieved – what had to be built.  After that we started working on the drawings.  I came back with the model and we worked on the drawings.  And I returned sometime later, a few months later with the drawings.  I am thinking about what she had told me at that time….  Yes, we spoke of how long it would take to build.  She saw that it would be completed very quickly, Mother.  For her it was a simple descent into matter.  I never felt any difficulty about building the city, not at all.  It seemed to me that it was going full swing on the scale that she had given to the city – and that it would follow the normal procedure and it would be built in 10-15 years.  This appeared to me to be absolutely logical:  especially as the first Aurovilians had started to arrive at that time.  There must already have been at least a dozen people working in Auroville, no more in ‘67.” [10 March 1996, Roger Anger conversation.]

Mother’s ideal town: “the dream was complete, without limit”

At the beginning of l968 Roger had submitted to the Mother two models, with slight variations, of what would be the final layout of the town. Satprem reported that in its spiralling form the Mother saw a galaxy: “You know that photograph of the galaxy? It’s very lovely. And one of the plans for Auroville is almost identical to it, and they did it without seeing the photograph of the galaxy…” On 28February 1968, Auroville Foundation Day, the two preliminary models of the Galaxy were displayed under the banyan tree. For the Mother as for her architect nothing was impossible, as Roger vibrantly points out:

R.: “Water was necessary—desalinating seawater.  Energy was required—she even considered nuclear energy.  It was at a level… of a considerable vastness.  The Olympic Games.  There were no problems anywhere.  Money?  No problem at all.  Money would flow.  Everything was possible.  The dream was complete, without limit.  It is perhaps this capacity that she passed on to me—Mother.  It is perhaps this capacity not to be satisfied with mediocrity.  That is what she passed on to me from the outset and which she passed on to me very early on – because I was able to pass it on when I returned to France to the whole architecture team who worked with me.  I came back saying that there was an absolutely fantastic project in India.  There is a concept of something that has never been done—of an unheard dimension.  Nothing stopped us at the concept level.  We thought of underground roads, of rolling side-walks… everything was possible. …That is how the Galaxy was born.  Because if at the beginning Mother would have given me some financial or economic constraints, we would only have made something small with possibilities for improvement taking into account India’s economic reality. … Not at all.  It was exactly the opposite.  She wanted perfection without any constraints.  That’s how we started to dream about it.  We all dreamt.  Was Mother dreaming?  In all likelihood also because she always said that the city existed already and that it only needed to be brought down on the material plane.  She kept saying, her face, I remember, with her face turned upwards with her two arms raised, she said: “But the city, my child, it is made, it exists, one has to bring it down.”  Ah, yes, it was a moment of extraordinary prestige that she brought. …And to pass on the message to us, it was something very precious because we were able to pass it on to others.” [10 March 1996, Roger Anger conversation.]

What town did the Mother approve? Beauty, for the Mother, has always been cardinal: beauty of thoughts, beauty of feelings, beauty of actions. She went as far as to say that some opening to beauty is essential to the undertaking of Integral Yoga. What role will beauty play in the materialisation of her ideal town, then, forerunning the advent of a new world that only a radical shift of consciousness can bring into manifestation? One of her first comments, written on the margin of Roger’s first report following Mother’s request six months earlier, was ‘elegant simplicity’. This applied not only to the residential zone but to the cultural and international ones, as well as to the industrial zone itself. In the Galaxy the four zones are separated by parks, making of Auroville a super-green city. The essential services, cultural and entertainment buildings, medias, plazas are aligned along the ‘service ring’ (now renamed crown road). The international zone features the pavilions of the various nations, evincing their genius. The residential zone is composed of long high-rise buildings, curvilinear (the lines-of-force; the longest one is positioned in this zone) whose height decreases towards the periphery, where smaller dwellings and single houses are accommodated. In this multicultural and multilingual township, the World University for Human Unity is the jewel of the cultural zone. The industrial zone, featuring smaller lines-of-force, whose height decreases towards the centre, hosts small-scale industries, pollution and noise-free, and ateliers; heavier industries are planned outside the city area, also along the coast. Re-creating the atmosphere of the beautiful cities of the past built on a human scale, fostering human encounters, there are porticos and covered walking spaces, patios, fountains, plazas, terraces, scenic perspectives. There are mobile sidewalks as in the airports; for speed traffic, as well as to deliver the goods necessary to the daily living, a network of electronically driven capsules is foreseen underground. Agriculture is to be carried on partly within the green belt’s area, partly outside. Rural cooperatives are run by Aurovilians and villagers on an equal basis. Producing all that is necessary to the citizen’s life, while selling the surplus outside, the town is expected to be economically self-sufficient. A luxuriant green belt, where no one is meant to live except the guardians, encircles the city. Interviewed in 1967 by “= 1”, “no car enters the city” said Roger, and all polluting traffic stops outside its edge; from that point onwards, only bicycles are allowed or electric vehicles at no more than 15 kilometres speed by the hour. The Aurovilians do all the work themselves, with no servants or paid workers: the Mother wished the villagers’ integration. Model villages, for those not yet ready for integration, are foreseen; Aspiration was scheduled to be the first one, after Auromodel was built.

Mobile partitions inside the buildings would allow to stretch or compress the space according to need, as in the Schroder House, the 1924 De Stijl jewel. The closer people lived to Matrimandir, the less space they would occupy. In 1971 the Galaxy album featured the same maps as the one the Mother had forwarded in 1969 to the Ford Foundation; but as the angle had been shifted because of two villages, reducing the radius from 1.5 km to 1,25 km, this explains why, despite the average height of vertical housing being 9 storeys, it could exceptionally rise up to 18 storeys. Excerpt from the 1970 album, apropos the Vertical Collective:

“An increasing number of levels from the centre of the town to the periphery, for the totality of houses, an average number of levels will be adopted (ex: building 1: 18 levels at the highest part, average number of levels: 9)

The volume determined by the surface of the acquired land and the average number of levels is composed of occupied spaces and empty spaces; its utilisation is not total, it corresponds to 65 % of the total volume (coefficient of utilisation: 0.65%).

For a better stability of all the vertical collective residences the distribution of the useful area is as follows:

60% cells and 40% flats.

The cell has 30 m2 for private use and 10 m2 for collective use.

Five cells can shelter six persons.

The flat has 75 m2 for private house, and 25 m2 for collective use.  On the average a flat can shelter 2 adults and 2 children (4 inhabitants per flat).”

Didn’t the Mother repeatedly stress that, the more one progresses, spiritually, the less one’s material needs? Minimum needs are the backbone of the society sheen visioned; commencing from the ‘Auroville Prosperity’ economic system, in kind, which she established three months after founding Auroville, akin to the system she adopted for the Sri Aurobindo Ashram.

In l969 Roger was busy preparing the plans of Auromodel, the ‘advanced colony’ meant to provide accommodation to two-three thousand architects, engineers, technicians, along with the needed staff and volunteers coming to build the town. As the name indicates, Auromodel was to provide the opportunity to experiment with both, urban design and social interaction. “It is good—it must be started … It is very necessary, it is very good”, the Mother commented with Satprem on 3 January 1970.

“The Mother was keen that we should acquire all the land – at least the inner circle – straightaway. I prepared a detailed note for acquisition of the required land and took it to the Chief Minister, Mr. Bhaktavatsalam, who was very understanding and approved the proposal. A Government Order was issued”—Anjani Dayanand, former Pondicherry Chief Secretary and a member of the CAA (Auroville Administrative Committee) recalled. But the staff to be appointed for the work of land acquisition would cost Rs.68, 000 per annum, and the SAS secretary Navajata did not accept. “When I informed the Mother about Navajata’s decision She was very unhappy, “Why has he taken this decision?” She asked. I told Her that Navajata felt that land acquisition through Government would take a long time; whereas direct purchase would be quicker. In retrospect this was obviously a wrong decision. I am mentioning this because it is good to know, at least now, what the Mother’s views were on the issue of land acquisition.” [I Remember”—An Interview with Anjani Dayanand, former Pondicherry Chief Secretary and CAA member.]

The Systems Engineering Galaxy

In June 1968 the magazine Scientific American published a special edition on urban planning; an advertisement by the Planning Research Corporation (they had just collaborated with NASA sending the first astronauts to the moon) caught the attention of electronic engineer Suresh Hindocha, twenty-six.[2] Dr. Sidney Firstman replied, explaining how with systems engineering new towns can be built in a few years. In consultation with the Mother, Suresh and his brother Harish maintained contact with Dr. Firstman and in November 1968 all met him in Paris, in Roger Anger’s studio, discussing for one week with the team of architects, Mother’s son Andre’ and a few Aurovilians how to materialize the Galaxy via systems engineering.

The Mother invited Sidney Firstman, he received her blessings in February 1969. At last, on 13 March 1969,she forwarded to the Ford Foundation in Delhi a request for partly financing a feasibility study for Auroville to be built in five years via systems engineering; a preliminary master plan, copy of the UNESCO’s resolutions and other relevant documents were attached. Internal intrigues made the Ford Foundation withdraw, but the Hindocha folder revealed the magnitude and perfection of the town the Mother wished to be built by the best people and technology of the time. An intense letters’ exchange followed. Firstman never lost faith and in December 1970 received the request by the United Nations, on behalf of the Government of India, to prepare a feasibility plan to materialize the Systems Engineering Galaxy. This is how Auroville was presented:

“The Sri Aurobindo Society, Pondicherry, India, a nongovernmental organisation affiliated     with the Indian National Commission for UNESCO, is presently engaged in early planning for the creation of an international cultural township to be known as Auroville. Development is proposed within township limits of approximately 11,000 acres and would include an international sector and cultural pavilions, with each national pavilion to contain residential quarters (for students, permanent residents and visitors), and cultural and national objects of that nations; a university; a Sanctuary of Truth; conference facilities for international youth programmes; a seaside tourist/resort; administration buildings; housing; Institute of Health Sciences; a model village for 100 Harijan families; an industrial zone; an industrial training institute and a model agricultural village and 1,000 acre farm with Polytechnic Institute. The Society has proposed this project as an international environment within which people of different countries could live together in harmony as one community and engage in cultural, educational, scientific and other pursuits in order to contribute to international understanding and the promotion of peace. The Society, its objectives and proposals have been endorsed by UNESCO, and Member States and international non-governmental organisations have been invited to participate in the development of Auroville. Land acquisition is already under way.”

Alas, the Pakistan war disrupted that second attempt too. A detailed presentation on the Systems Engineering Galaxy is available at this link: https://overmanfoundation.org/the-systems-engineering-galaxy-of-auroville-as-approved-by-the-mother-by-paulette-hadnagy/

Mother’s secretary to UNESCO, Kailash Javeri, reported that in September 1974 the United Nations were ready to support the World University for Human Unity; but the increasingly difficult relationship between the residents and the Sri Aurobindo Society made this impossible.

*

In 1987 I received from Suresh Hindocha photocopies of his archive, overwhelming. It was the first time that the documentation was made available, in Auroville nobody knew what had exactly happened. We three researchers at the Laboratory of Evolution/Centre of Human Unity organised a mini exhibition in our premises, also distributing two posters that Rolf Lieser (an Aurovilian designer) made for us. Not only we reintroduced Mother’s town to the community, but we made widely known that Mother’s choice was the Systems Engineering Galaxy.

On 24 February 2009 Suresh Hindocha gave a memorable speech at the Auroville Town Hall; Kailash Javeri, Mother’s secretary to UNESCO, was also present. It was recorded by the Auroville radio and the audio is available. Last year I contacted Suresh Hindocha, relocated to England, for permission to publish the folder I received from him. Movingly, he tried to contact Sidney Firstman, but received no reply… Passing by the Hindocha mansion, uninhabited since years, makes me shiver: ‘the Avatar’s model town’ was about to manifest, we missed the train.

Auroville’s green belt

A major conversation on 30 December 1967—recorded—was first published in the Ashram’s Bulletin, and afterwards in Mother’s Agenda and in Mother’s Centenary Edition too (vol. 13, published by the Sri Aurobindo Ashram), from which this excerpt is taken. “For example, those who produce food, like Aurofood—of course, when we are 50,000 it will be difficult to provide for all the needs, but for the moment we are only a few thousand at most – well, a factory always produces far too much, so it will sell outside and receive money”. [Collected Works of the Mother, Volume 13, p. 270]

From where would the food come? The second layout the Mother approved, in 1967, writing on it “the town of the future”, envisioned a large agricultural zone, on the south side, externally. This was a steady postulate since Mother’s first creation where Sri Aurobindo would have lived at the centre, on top of a hill, turning what was a virgin forest into her ideal town, gated; outside it she wished farms and crops, and on the opposite side an industrial estate. As she told Satprem, on 23 June 1965, the city would be self-sufficient. The virgin forest would be cut down and the timber used or sold; the agricultural estate would provide the food for the entire city. But there was no hint of a green belt, nor there was any in Mother’s less grand creation, thirty years later, in any of the three layouts by Roger that she successively approved.

At last, I was unveiled the truth by late Prem Malik, who lived with his wife in a monolocale house built by Roger in Auromodel. The Mother had put Prem in charge of Auroville’s economic zone and, in 1970, also of the Matrimandir fundraising brochure. Prem, a Galaxy lover, asked the Mother how would her special town be protected, materially, spiritually, from the outer world: a ‘green belt’ was needed, a true buffer zone, and the Mother enthusiastically accepted his suggestion. The green area encircling the town would be reserved to parks, gardens, orchards, farms, greenery, a true leisure space where Aurovilians would stroll and relax after a full working day. No permanent houses were to be built, only temporary shelters for guardians vigilant over encroachments. All polluting transport would halt outside its boundaries, with special parking nodes.

“The Galaxy plan ideal for a car-free culture”

In February 2005 the Aurovilian architect Helmut Schmidt, in consultation with Hans Billinger, presented a preliminary concept of mobility that the chief-architect, Roger Anger, endorsed. The collective transportation would be connected to the service nodes and municipal shuttle services would be accessible within walking distances. Helmut recalled:

“In 2001 Mr. Hans Billinger, a traffic planner who lives in Stuttgart, Germany, told some Aurovilians that he considers the structure and proportions of the Galaxy plan ideal for a car-free culture: all areas of the city are within 5 or 6 minutes walking distance from the Crown Road. The outer ring road could take motorised traffic and connect with centralised parking areas there. Onward travel would be by bicycle or public transport via the radials and along the Crown, which could become the backbone of a public transport system (buses, tramways, or monorail). The Crown Road is 4 kilometres long. Assuming an average speed for the public transport of 16 km/hour (including stops), the Crown Road can be circled within 15 minutes. If only one bus would be circling constantly, and one walks to and from the bus, it would still be possible to reach any point in town in less than 30 minutes.”

He further explained:

“The Auroville Master Plan envisages the street as a common space for all. Wherever vehicular movement is permissible within Auroville itself it will be restricted to approximately 15 km/h, a speed indicated by the Mother.

• All fast-moving vehicular traffic will remain outside the city limits. Parking areas would be provided on the periphery from where non-polluting transport alternatives would be provided for entry into the city areas.
• All of Auroville’s traffic systems will be provided and managed by the municipality.
• Auroville will provide the most energy-efficient, non-polluting, user-friendly modes of mass, and individual, public conveyance systems.
• There will be no other private or independent traffic systems inside the town (except for emergency access such as the ambulance).” 

Roger and “the new consciousness”: “another man”, “right on the brink of something”

Having had the final vision of the Chamber, on 1st January l970, the Mother instructed Roger to build Matrimandir. This profoundly impacted Roger. On 20 May l970 she told Satprem: “Things are stirring in R. (Mother laughs a lot). He’s thorn between the old man full of attachments over there, and the new life, the new consciousness that is beginning to be interesting.”

Three days later Satprem informed the Mother that he had met Roger, twice, because the architect had so many questions about “the new consciousness”. Excerpt:

S:“It’s interesting. First, I found him considerably changed. (Mother nods her head)

He is another man. And I found him near, not far. I had the feeling that he was near. (Mother nods)And he was enormously interested in this new consciousness. He said, ‘I would really like to experience this new consciousness, so what has to be done?’ He told me, ‘All the spiritual stories tell you shouldn’t do this, you shouldn’t do that, and you have to do this, you have to meditate and…

M: No, no!

S: So I tried to explain to him that this new consciousness just wasn’t like that.

M: Yes. But he didn’t speak to me about it.

S: It bothers him a lot, ‘What has to be done to experience the new consciousness?’

M: He needs to be helped.

S: I have the impression that he’s right on the brink of something.

M: Yes.

S: What’s to be done to experience the new consciousness?

M: Well, you could help him.

S: I tried to tell him something; I don’t know if I did…

M: To me, he doesn’t ask anything.

S: Still he said to me, ‘Oh, I go to see Mother every morning and it’s my oxygen’. Yes, we talk about what’s happening out there [in Auroville], and then I tell him (very frankly, I must say) what I see and understand, that yes… But I mean he doesn’t talk about himself at all. He’s thorn by France, by his attachments. But I tell you, I feel he’s on the point of something.

M: Oh, yes! Oh, yes!

S: He has to hang on yet for some time.

M: You can help him a lot.

S: What I tried to tell him is that this new consciousness doesn’t demand spiritual athletics, great concentration and meditation and tapasya, or any special virtue…

M: No.

S: It simply demands trust in something else, a kind of childlike trust, and a need for something else.

M: Yes, that’s it.

S: He was especially afraid it was again a ‘matter of spiritual discipline’.

M: No, no, no! No question of that! But people always fall into that! Even in Auroville: meditation! And I can’t decently tell them it’s useless! (Mother laughs.)

S: He was touched by what I told him and reassured. Only he doesn’t know what to do.

M: But you can tell him things that will help him. It is a very good sign that he asked you to see him.”

[More followed. Satprem concludes the conversation by these words:]

M: Oh (laughter)… Well, you’ve really transformed him in any case… (Mother laughs.) Me too!”

“A genius whom one cannot fathom and yet a friend”

I saw Roger Anger for the first time in 1986, it was just a glimpse. What struck me was the classy simplicity of his clothing and that although he was over 60, with his rosy complexion and piercing eyes he looked young. I was soon to discover that what Kireet Joshi wrote as a tribute, when Roger dropped the body, was the exact representation of this soul unique:

“Roger was extremely warm, informal and friendly. He was unassuming. I always found in him a genius whom one cannot fathom and yet a friend, in the waters of whose affection one could easily swim. “L’ Homme du Projet!”— These words of the Mother for Roger sum up splendidly and gloriously all that was so beautifully packed in that great artist, visionary, sculptor and architect. To symbolize this aspiration preeminently was the privilege of Roger. The task that the Mother had given him for Auroville remained for decades and decades throughout his life the sovereign occupation. He tried to fulfill that task as an instrument of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother. Like all adventurers who have striven to participate in a new experiment that has universal dimensions, he had to forge ahead through enormous difficulties, internal and external.”

One year later, in 1987, I got the baptism of the fire. I was one among dozens of Aurovilians who worked from morning till night, sometimes till early in the morning, day in and day out, without breaks, to prepare the revised model of the Matrimandir. A general meeting was called to take the final decision; the alternative was a cement shell by Piero Cicionesi, the Matrimandir site architect, to be covered with white marble slabs, Paolo Tommasi’s design—an Italian architect and designer. Roger had altered the original model the Mother had approved in 1970in order to allow the insertion of the only disks possible in a relatively easy way, on the cement structure that Piero had built in his absence. In one of the many conciliatory acts typical of him, Roger had also lowered the petals.

Those working at his model were a congeries of types tied together by his charismatic presence. An unsuspected trait of Roger struck me: his ebullient, ‘1968’ personality, as my LOE/CHU colleague Helene (she had participated to the occupation of the Sorbonne in May 68) quickly pointed out. Friendly, passionate, enthusiastic, Roger made feel everybody that he/she could make it, whatever his/her background, training, education (or none), empowering each and all. This was one prominent facet of a man unique—a perception that never left me since. He was simply irresistible. Charmed, enflamed, we worked as hard as possible, rising above personal tastes and preferences, in an atmosphere of joy and self-offering truly contagious. An exhilarating experience, this was one of those rare events where I experienced the real spirit by which we should serve Auroville: true human unity.

In the night that preceded the fatal day, 15 October 1987, I suddenly ‘saw’ in all its splendour the golden Matrimandir the Mother had approved, and which I had till then resisted, enthralled by my rationalist/functionalist background. I fell on my knees. Over 250 Aurovilians gathered for that historical meeting, lasting seven uninterrupted hours. The conflict with the Sri Aurobindo Society continued, money was scarce; the exhibition I displayed was made of humble photocopies of the fundraising Matrimandir brochure, A 3 size, with Mother’s full-page ‘Blessings’ and signature. Prem Malik had lent to me for one week the original specimen; I lived in a hut under a keet roof, how frightened was I that anything could happen! Those photocopies, Mother’s Blessings did the miracle. Two of Roger’s fiercest opposers wished to cancel the meeting and send everybody home right away, commenting that the Mother had already decided and we had no saying. The Aurovilians were so enflamed that they wished to tear down the cement structure, to replace it with the tubular metal structure and the disks of the original concept the Mother had approved. Roger Anger was reinstated as Mother’s chief architect by furore populi. Piero’s structure was saved by Roger himself who, as always magnanimous, offered to Piero the completion of the Chamber; he would look after the completion of the general structure and the gardens.

Battling for Matrimandir was over—we thought, how wrong were we!—Mother’s town was the next battle. We were poor, the contention with the Sri Aurobindo Society was not over, how could we commence the town? Calling four of his faithful, Roger unveiled a proposal from Auroville International France: they would finance a residential building with view on Matrimandir; some flats would be allotted to them visiting. But there were no compromises, those years; we refused unanimously and went on living in our precarious accommodations. The issue was never discussed again.

“Follow Roger”

For six months everybody worked in harmony, then it started all over. Around the millennium anew fight commenced, raging for years, over the Matrimandir’s gardens and lake.

Kireet Joshi, at that time the Chairman of the Governing Board, had asked me to prepare a booklet documenting for the Governing Board the evolving plans of Mother’s town and the Matrimandir, along with an exhibition, to be submitted to the Governing Board (Roger was a member). They promptly acknowledged the role the Mother had assigned to her chief architect, but even so the fight went on; Kireet called a general meeting, twice, to warn us that the Auroville Foundation could be dissolved. He also reported the intense experience he had after open-heart surgery:

“In this personal tribute to Roger, I should like to narrate that episode which brought me closest to Roger. That was in the year 2001. That was the second year of my Chairmanship of Auroville Foundation. I had come to learn a great deal of the problems that the Matrimandir was confronted with. I had heard praises of Roger. I had heard criticisms of Roger. I was struggling to understand the truth beyond praises and criticisms. The cacophony in Auroville about Matrimandir and about the role of Roger in Matrimandir was so noisy that I was unable to get at that source of information where I could glimpse and understand the real truth that could unlock the great obstruction that was blocking the progression of Matrimandir. I was praying to the Mother to guide me and to help me.

That guidance came to me at an unexpected moment. On 31st March, 2001, I was being wheeled to the ICU, just after my heart surgery in the Apollo Hospital at Delhi. I had hardly recovered my consciousness, and as I was being put on the bed, I was just waking up from my deep slumber. Suddenly, I felt greatly gripped by intense pain. I knew that it was not physical pain; I felt that it was the pain that touched the central part of my life and work in which I was involved at that moment. I asked the Mother inwardly: “What is this pain, Mother?” The answer that I received was: “Matrimandir”. And as I looked deeply into that answer, a deep guidance flowed from my inmost being and soul. The Mother was whispering to me: “Follow Roger.” There was immense silence, and there was a deep sense of release, and my pain had vanished.

During the next six months, I followed up the revelation and the guidance that I had received through my inner experience. I critically examined all that I had heard of Roger and all that I had heard about Matrimandir, – praises and criticisms, – in a state of relentless inquiry and self-criticism. I came to the conclusion that what Roger was telling me of the Mother’s intention about Matrimandir was true, and the more I read the original statements of the Mother, the more She led me to the right path and to the real understanding of Roger. And I have deep gratification that I could become a channel of facilitating the advancement of the work of Roger regarding Matrimandir, even though I have deep regret that the harmony and unity that I had striven for earnestly could not be attained because the power of resistance to that harmony was too great.”

In his tribute to Roger, Kireet continued:

“How often he used to tell me during the seven years, 2000–2007, when I came greatly in close touch with him: “The Mother has given me the task; would you not help me?” The Mother had said that the first task was to accomplish Matrimandir, and that once that is done, she would do the rest. Roger’s life was a life of great struggle: even those who appreciated him opposed him from time to time, and there were distressing moments of frustrating disappointment. From time to time, he had felt that he was not understood and that his was a voice in wilderness. And yet he was not entirely alone, and there were hundreds who admired him and were ready to collaborate. And there has been Jacqueline, a rare companion who always understood him and stood by him and shared intimately the lot of his battles.”

War II concluded reasserting once more Roger as Mother’s architect, by the force of two Residents’ Assembly meetings and one referendum; a newly appointed Secretary to the Auroville Foundation, Sharma, dismissed the Matrimandir Coordination Group that had tried to impose Paolo Tommasi’s gardens. After the fight was over, a much emotional reunion followed: Paolo, Roger and Jacqueline embraced each other, in tears, friends as before; I got it directly from the three of them. I was the main activist and shared the same intense experience with the family leading the opposition: our friendship resumed. This is Integral Yoga; the Mother only knows the rules of the game. Auroville is the alchemical crucible of transformation: all in the furnace!

Tremendous forces are at work to hamper the divine creation; all of us who thoroughly assisted Roger in his mission carried a cross. Egos were shattered, reveries of an easy life were blown up all the time. At times we got sick. But in sadhana, this is a boon. One’s faithfulness and surrender are tested relentlessly until nothing remains but the Ideal—stripped naked of anything else but the certainty that, one day, Mother’s Auroville will be. The infrarational humanity we are will transition to the subjective and finally the spiritual age. Then Auroville will be, doesn’t matter when: this is the Avatar’s task and no one’s else.

“What is important is not to build a town but, once more, to build new men”

The following excerpt from “Auroville”, a film where in December 1972Roger Anger is interviewed for France’s National Television by a leading French journalist (Jean Pierre Elkabash also took part in the strikes of May 1968) opens to the other dimension of Auroville. Roger speaks with the equipoise and assurance of an established yogi, as if in a trance. I knew him from close, for years we had exhilarating exchanges; but never I saw him, warm and enthusiastic, speaking that way, as if some other power spoke through him.

In Auroville this film is screened over and again by the French Pavilion; every time I cry, lifted to another space where Auroville is forever. This is the link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=948n-FFjYNM. Roger appears twice; below is my literal translation:

“Roger: There will be no laws in Auroville and above all no jail, above all no police. This is not only a hope but a necessity, without which the Auroville experience would have no meaning. The fact of wanting an organisation based on a change of consciousness in man implies necessarily that all the old habits in our cities, our traditions disappear. Otherwise, what would be the use of an experimental city, where other life criteria, other relationships criteria between men must be defined?

Q.: Do you believe that all forms of repression can disappear?

Roger: It is the confidence I have in man, in evolution, that makes me believe in what I say. It is the startup of the experience already unfolding that convinces me that this is not only possible, it is evidence.

Q.: Have you done like the Brazilians in Brazilia? Did you build a city that you wanted people to move in?

Roger: Not at all. I believe this is at the very basis of the Auroville principle. If the people who come for this profession of faith are not able to build their own environment, this would mean that Auroville is a failure. It is essential that it is built on the basis of individual experience. We could thus locate Auroville at the opposite of the traditional process of contemporary urbanism. In our urbanistic conceptions we do a city on paper, on the basis of a conception as intelligent as it can be, then ask people to come and inhabit it. Here the process is reversed; people live the experience, and it is starting from this experience that their conditions, their environment, their lifestyle will be established, created.

Q.: Wouldn’t you like to receive money, credits to accelerate the construction?

Roger: Surely. Surely. An undertaking like this can be built almost only through difficulties. If there is no ripeness of the problems at the level of the people who live the experiment, it seems difficult to be able to conceive that Auroville’s ambition can be total, at the height of its goals, its messages. It must be, I would say, a somehow painful childbirth, so that the human infrastructure necessary to this realisation gets constituted. The fact of building men at the level of the complete man is already a thing so difficult that it cannot be done with the material facilities we are accustomed to in the West.

Q.: Auroville will never be completed then?

Roger: Maybe not. But this has no importance at all. What is important is not to build a town but, once more, to build new men. From there, what the delay is, how long is it going to take, only the future, maybe, will tell us. I hope fast.

Q.: In other words, Auroville and the new men go together.

Roger: No doubts. It is evident.”

Roger’s testament: the Resolution by the Residents’ Assembly, 2007

In 1999 the Residents’ Assembly had endorsed a masterplan retaining major principles of the city set by the Mother in 1965. A masterplan is mandatory, also for protection from encroaching and unwanted developments; but it has to be formulated in an impeccable legal and technical jargon. The Auroville Universal Township Master Plan (Perspective: 2025) was approved by the Ministry of Human Resource Development on 12 April 2001. Murli Manohar Joshi, the minister, wrote in the introduction: “it is gratifying that the Master Plan has not only been designed by the residents of Auroville and approved by the Governing Board, but the Town and Country Planning Office of the Union Ministry of Urban Development has also extended valuable collaboration and thus enhanced the excellence of this Plan.” However, there are discrepancies between the two documents; and the legally binding recognition by the Tamil Nadu government, the state where are Auroville is located, is still pending, protection is limited.

In April 2007 the Auroville Residents’ Assembly passed a resolution endorsing the mandate conferred to L’Avenird’Auroville (Auroville’s planning group). This was the result of a meticulous work, weighting every single word, when Roger was still among us. The key rests with Annexe 1 & 2, defining the essential principles of the Galaxy; among others, the implementation of “the lines of force that give the shape of the Galaxy”.

Resident Assembly Resolution April 2007

Annexe 01

Main Elements of the Galaxy Concept and Master Plan

—50,000 Aurovilian resident population;

—Four zones: Residential, Industrial, Cultural and International;

—Matrimandir with its twelve gardens and the lake at the centre of the city;

—The crown and the city centre;

—The lines of force that give the shape of the Galaxy;

—About 50% of the city area is green;

—Detailed city planning and development based on the master plan in a spirit of experimentation and innovation;

—Search for beauty.

NOTES

The architectural forms, the choice of materials, the lay-out of parks and gardens, the different means of transportation, the required services and infrastructure etc. will evolve according to the needs, the advances in know-how and technology, experiments and new discoveries in:  innovative, sustainable energy systems; sustainable water management including rain water harvesting; non-polluting transport systems; planning aimed at a collective way of life. Referral of matters to Roger should progressively reduce as it is expected that an increasingly mature and capable Planning Organisation will resolve most issues while respecting the main elements of the Galaxy Concept and the Master Plan.

Annexe 02

Matters to be referred to Roger for approval/final decision

—Town planning aspects relating to the main elements of the Galaxy Concept and the Master Plan of Auroville (see Annexe 01);

—Urban design of the township;

—Architectural concepts (quality of architecture).

NOTE: Escalation of matters to Roger should progressively reduce as it is expected that an increasingly mature and capable Planning Organisation will resolve most issues while respecting the main elements of the Galaxy Concept and the Master Plan.

Chateau Le Crestet

This was Roger Anger’s testament. Nine months later, on 15 January 2008, aged 84, Roger left the body at Le Crestet, the chateau in Provence that he had transformed from ruins into a manifesto of art and beauty. [https://www.admagazine.fr/adinspiration/article/chateau-de-crestet-chef-oeuvre-architecture-provence

https://leadingestates.com/estates/europe/france/provence/chateau-du-crestet-provence-france/]

Roger had been unwell for some time; but he had already overcome other crises and was ready to return to Auroville to pursue his mission, whenthe Mother called him. Among the many tributes to Roger Maharaj Karan Singh, Chairman of the Auroville Governing Board, voiced us all; as reported by the Auroville Working Committee: “as Chief Architect of Auroville he had succeeded brilliantly in designing, building and completing Matrimandir, one of the architectural marvels of the world, which the Mother called the soul of Auroville. Matrimandir will stand, for all times, as an eloquent testimony to his creative genius, his great devotion to the Mother and his earnest commitment to the cause of Auroville.”

An Ashram alumni and early Aurovilian, Tapas Bhatt, reported: “In Roger’s spacious salon, we saw him sleeping in peace. There was an intense meditative mood pervading in and around us. Lots of roses and flowers of immortality were showered on him. Candles and incense were lighted to accompany him with our prayers. On behalf of Auroville and Roger’s family and friends, the beautiful wreathes and bouquet of flowers placed on Roger seemed to give a special touch.”

Mother’s creation is immortal. As an Aurovilian architect asked, “Have we achieved even a fraction of the beauty and the aspiration that this specific project [the Galaxy] captured – which itself was decades ahead of its time?”

To my master of surrender

In 2001 I cycled to Roger’s house in Auromodel, but it was different from the other times I visited him. I cannot recall why I went there, to discuss what. The only thing I remember is that Roger took me to his working space in the basement, full of everything. He walked straight to one collage-painting, with two dark teal-blue stripes painted on the sides, inserted into a wooden black frame, mat, and gave it to me, writing a dedication on the back. Not even his words I remember.

I felt as if I always knew that object— not some other in Roger’s collection, no, that specific item. I took it home and hung it next to the drawings of my grandfather, a Futurist painter of Montmartre bohemia; I felt it was the most natural thing in the world, as if it had always been there. Futurism and avant-garde Roger fitted like hand in glove. An intimate reality, the collage-painting, with no name, no history—can it have any?—stands since then as my talisman, my anchor and spear. I had been knighted.

THAT world exists, beyond space and time. This is the tale of that primeval form, familiar to me and yet unfathomable. Eons pass by, the perfect, ideal society is forever: Auroville. Anything else is an illusion. There is no death. Only Reality. 

Beyond the chief-architect I saw the sadhak—in his spiritual humility Roger would have jerked at me using such term—throwing everything in the alchemical furnace till only surrender is left. Roger was worn out. Whenever he hugged me, his body was as cold as ice, making me wonder how could he survive. His super-human surrender to the Mother kept him alive despite his physical frailty. I am threading the path he has shown me by example—all Their people go through the same. Emaciated, till the end standing up: das, their servants. Kireet Joshi was another. Pashi Kapoor. Prem Malik. Luigi Zanzi. And many more, even those dissenting from Roger, or temporarily parting ways, oneness remains: Sri Aurobindo made it clear. This is the Avatar’s circle, taking birth every time the Avatar manifests, whatever their human imperfections.

Some years ago, alone in the amphitheatre, I saw the gigantic face of Roger, with piercing eyes, as if transfixing me. I got the message: SURRENDER! We must be strong and brave, the battle will not subside until ‘the Avatar’s model town’ is reality. Not some new town: Their town.

Sixteen years have elapsed; I have never been able to experience his death: Roger has dissolved into the Mother. He is the wind and the dew, the earth and the sky, the lizard and the villager, the grass and the mountain. Roger is the eternal quest of man. Roger is “das”, the servant of the incarnated Divine. Roger is me and you and us—the moment we discard the littleness we are and grow, by the aspiration of our heart, by the light of our soul, into what we truly are: the Self, the Divine, the Atman. Willing servitors of the Divine Consciousness.

Balakrishna Doshi: “a model of life, a model of living”

Late Balakrishna Doshi, Pritzer Price—the Nobel of architecture—was the Governing Board’s member in charge of Auroville’s planning section. His is the highest tribute:

“Roger’s plan of the Galaxy… to me it suggests a whole lot of visions. Visions of connectivity, potentials, diversities, huge amount of choices—including the potentials of getting a place for everybody. It was really the city of the universe. And why it is not happening, why it is not moving, I have no idea at all. 

So the question is: should we talk of it as a city, or should we talk about ‘galaxy’? There’s a big difference between the words ‘city’ and ‘galaxy’. I think we are talking about very small, micro level—and we are talking about Mother. It’s a big paradox, a huge difference between the two statements.

So when you look at the Galaxy— and I remember, often when I saw the model, and when I had been thinking there, and when there was a discussion going on – first thing is, ‘what is galaxy?’ Galaxy is the magnet of the universe in which things move, and they move in a dynamic balance. That is what I know. And I’m just guessing. And everything can be absorbed, and everything can manifest, and everything adds its own value and ability to regenerate, revitalize. And I think that is ‘galaxy’. Galaxy is not a small house with a compound wall. It’s a fluid thing, it has interconnections. It has many levels, it goes up and down, etc.

When the model was made, the model was not really representing the kind of galaxy that I had seen in Roger’s plan. And I think the first thing we should know is: are we really talking about a building? Or are we talking about celebration of life? That’s what I think Mother was talking about. How do you charge the souls to manifest their subtle existence and the purpose of their existence. Do we talk about this at all? Or are we talking about ‘my kitchen is not working,’ or ‘the costs are like this,’ or ‘I have no road,’ or ‘I have no water supply’… I think the issue is first, we should remove these words of architecture and building. We should talk about how do we celebrate life on this planet, and make a model.

So when you talk about celebration, you are talking about total sustainability relationships, potentials, expanding our ideas, expanding our horizons. And I think this is not happening. So we start talking about little things… we go to the canteen and we have our little plate, and we talk and this is our universe – is this really what we are talking? What Mother must be thinking!

And I think that plan shows you the micro, macro, all the levels of housing etc., can be built there. And Roger was upset because I was not working, I did not reply to him. And when I saw the Auromodele houses which he had done in the beginning… you could see how this person who comes from Paris to be here, who had a large practice, gives away everything and does these little things here… and he talks about climate, he talks about fluidity, he talks about visions, and he talks about lightness. And I think those are the things which are pioneering works.

Earlier photographs which I had seen, from Piero and others, thatched buildings and thatched houses, when the land was absolutely dry, barren land – there was an aspiration. There was a vision. And there was an idealism. And it was not talked about, ‘what is the population’. We always look at it as if it is a part of the universe. We are global. We are not local, we are not regional. We are not small people. I think this is where the first difference to me is.

And that should be removed. And we should talk about saying, ‘how do we understand what galaxies are’. We don’t even know (I don’t know at all), but when I imagine, when I think about it, there is a dynamic balance, and that balance generates energies, and those energies help the whole cosmic order of the universe. In this, health and hygiene things come—but more than that, the inner sensitivities which Mother is talking about, come out. And I think we have to talk about not ourselves as beings—we have to talk about this galaxy which continues, and it will go on and on and on, and it will become a model. A model of life, a model of living.

What is happening is, given as architects we look at architecture, at building—this is not building, it is life. How do you celebrate life, how do you give life, how do you generate life, and how do you enrich life. And I think this is something which one has to talk about.” [http://wiki.auroville.org.in/wiki/Galaxy_Planhttp://wiki.auroville.org.in/wiki/Galaxy_Plan]

*

[1] The Three Towers stand in the middle of a park, on l’Ile Verte (Green Island), at the centre of Grenoble. Each tower is 98 metres high without the antenna, comprises 28 inhabited storeys, is made of 33 levels and is served by 4 elevators. Together, the towers (named after the three mountains at whose feet lies Grenoble) host 504 apartments, spacious and luminous – each of them with view on two of the mountains. The anti-seismic/hydraulic system especially devised makes the architecture so flexible that in the case of strong winds the inner walls vibrate. The towers are surrounded by ponds, bridges, lightened fountains, marbles and colonial woods: the work of a group of young artists, sculptors, ceramists etc., calling themselves “L’Oeuf” (“The Egg”), usual collaborators of Roger Anger. The “Three Towers” have their own website; recently refurbished, their refined elegance and efficiency still remain a major source of attraction in this university-town.

[2] Suresh Hindocha is the nephew of Huta and the son of Laljibhai, the industrialist whom the Mother put in charge of Auroville’s industrial zone. A reincarnation from Egypt, the Mother said of Laljibhai. The Hindocha family purchased most of the land for Matrimandir.

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About the Author: A senior member of Auroville, Paulette Hadnagy is a photographer, author and compiler whose published works include titles like At the Crossroads: the Evolution of the Spiritual Being, Immortal India—Towards the Ideal Society, The Gnostic Cycle—Towards the Supermind, Avatarhood—Human and Divine, Sri Aurobindo—Compassionate Grace and Laughter, Being of Gold—Our Goal of Self-Perfection, Becoming One—The Psychology of Integral Yoga, The Process of the Integral Yoga, Crossroad: the New Humanity, The Little Child and the Holy Knight — A Vedantin Tale. Regarding Auroville, she has published: The Auroville Foundation Act and the Mother’s Guidelines: a Comparative Study and The New Being and the New Society: A Compilation of the Mother’s Words and Archival Material During the Formative Years of Auroville and Interacting with UNESCO during Mother’s years.