My association with the Mother

Kireet-bhai this interview is a way to ask you to speak about the Mother. And first, because you were there at that time, and we were not there. And we feel like asking you, what was it like to be there at that special time, in that special place, and to be there in this atmosphere that surrounded the Mother.

I used to go to the Mother every Sunday from the 18th May 1969, up to the 30th of March 1973. And the question that you're asking is to how I feel, it's a very difficult question, because it is inexplicable, ineffable, how to express the ineffable. You felt completely comforted. And surprisingly, one never felt that you are in the presence of some very, very great, very great presence. It was as if in the depth of your Mother, so comfortable, so easy, and so happy, there was all the time available, in fact, she never seemed to be in a hurry. And I used to ask many questions to the Mother about the centre of education, and about Sri Aurobindo’s action, about Auroville. And every time her answer was immediate, there was no gap between question and answer, she never felt that she had now to think over it. The answer was almost ready, it was ready to come forth. As if the answer was before my question, and where there was absolute concentration of the Mother, such concentration I have never seen anywhere.

When I spoke a word, it was completely heard by her. Of course, some people used to say that Mother doesn't hear, but I contradict it fully, because up to 30th of March 1973, whatever I spoke to her, she heard fully well. She corrected things which I spoke, and I had a complete assurance that she heard, she replied precisely to the question that I had asked, and there was no mistake about it at all. And there was no hesitation in answering any question at all.

Well, I can only say that I was in the lap of the Mother, and I am congratulating my left arm, because she used to caress my left arm several times during my visit to her. And it was full of love, and most joyous time of my life, in fact, most privileged golden time. Let me tell you some of the internal experiences that I had.

I met the Mother for the first time in 1952. My first, when I went to her, I was introduced to her as a pupil of my teacher who had taken me to her. And then, for seven days, I stayed in Golconda, and I used to go every day to tennis ground, when my Mother used to play tennis. And I always used to feel, I used to feel that when she used to throw the ball, as if she was playing with the universe. That was my feeling in my heart. That she was playing with the whole universe, she was throwing the ball. Every ball was as it were, the universe, and she was beating the universe as it were by the way, her racket.

On the last seventh day, when I was leaving, I had gone to her in the playground, in the room where Sri Aurobindo’s portrait is still there, in that room I went, and she gave me a bunch of flowers of purity, jasmine flowers. So many, both the arms, both my palms were full. And I remember that when I went to the train, I felt the same Mother standing before me. And for seven days thereafter, I had the same experience as if the Mother was everywhere. I looked around, I felt the Mother was there. And that was my first experience of the Mother.

But then later on, I had come one day to have an interview with the Mother, I prayed to her. She said, but I am so busy for two months, I am completely booked. So I could not meet her personally, but I had written a letter to her. And she replied to me not in words, but in actions. And all my problems, which I put before her, they came to be resolved one after the other. And in 1955, I had come here, and she had remarked to somebody that boy is a nice boy. She had said to somebody. And then in 1956, when I came to remain here permanently here, next day her secretary told me that I had never seen Mother so happy, as when she said, oh, he's so nice, so nice. I feel ashamed to tell you this because it is concerning me. But I was very, very happy, I am very encouraged by the Mother. Even today I feel encouraged when I feel that I am now failing, I am going away. I still feel encouraged by the words that she had spoken at that time.

And first work she gave me, was in the press, then in the library. And the library time was a very good time for me. I had used to spend a lot of time in meditation. And one day in the evening, I had an experience of my witness self. I cannot say it was me, but there was a self which was watching. And the prayer was rising from my heart, and I said, “Mother, I want to teach”. I myself did not know this, but I was witnessing my prayer, “Mother, I want to teach”. And I had not spoken to anybody about it at all. But the very next day, Pavitrada came in search of Kirit Joshi, he had never known me. But he found me in the library, and he told me that Mother wants you to be registrar of the Center of Education. But she wants to know whether you would like to be. So I said, whatever Mother wants me to be, I shall be. So this is the answer I gave and he went away.

But next day came, again and he said, “Mother is not satisfied with your answer. You will certainly like to do whatever Mother says. But what do you want? Would you like to be registrar?” So I said, “yes, yes, I will”. And that was the time, it was in November 1958, I think. And December 16, the school was opening. And within one month, we were changing the entire system of education. And I did that work very happily with the help of my friend, Prof. Joshi, even now he is there in the laboratory, one of my greatest friends. With his help, I could do the work within one month's time to open the school with a new system of education, which I will not describe now.

That was my beginning of my work as it were with the Mother. Because although I never went to the Mother personally, but Mother had in about two years later Mother had said to Pavitra, “now you are my post office between me and Kirit”. And so I used to refer many questions about the Center of Education, about the development of the school and so on. In 1969, Pavitrada left his body. And thereafter, on the 16th of May, and on the 17th evening, I was standing near the Samadhi, and Champaklal came to me at that time near Samadhi. It was Saturday evening, and he said, Grace, Grace, Grace of the Mother. So I turned to him and he said, “Mother has said every Sunday morning, she will see you first on every Sunday.” So 8 o'clock in the morning, be present at the Mother's room.

So from 18th, and when I went to the Mother's first time, she was so gentle. Oh my Lord, so gentle. And she said, would you like to sit on a stool? She offered me to sit on the stool. I said, no, no, no, I will sit on the floor. And then she said, is there sufficient light? Then she told Sudha-Bhen, “bring the light here, Lumier!”, she said. And then I said, “but I don't need that light. I can read quite well”. I must say that I used to write down everything that I used to ask the Mother on every Saturday night. So that I don't waste my time in order to find the right words and so on. So I used to read out to her all my questions and she used to answer every question separately. One by one. And very quickly. And this went on until the month of September 1972, in the meantime, many things developed in our Centre of Education.

the first thing that I had to do was to write a letter to the Prime Minister of India when I joined the school. What had happened, I don't know, but I was asked, by Pavitrada, to write a letter to Prime Minister describing our Centre of Education and asking for support. So I wrote that letter which was read by the Mother and maybe Mother liked that letter so much that she printed my description of the Centre of Education in the Bulletin. So that means that within one month, I had mastered as it were the entire philosophy of education of Sri Aurobindo. Of course, I was reading Sri Aurobindo’s books much earlier, so it was not a big effort on my part.

There were three events which were very important during the time, in the time of Pavitrada, when we were working. Actually I used to meet Pavitrada every day twice, once in the morning and once in the afternoon. And every day, whatever questions came, he used to take from me and the next day, there were replies from the Mother. And again in the afternoon, I had many questions. Again, there used to refer to the Mother. By the next morning, I had the answers to the questions.

It must have been that sometimes you had some questions and the answer, how could you explain? I mean, the answer must have been from the Divine Mother and also from the physical Mother. No, I mean...

Well, I had never felt that Mother was a physical Mother. It was always a Divine Mother.

But you said it was also like my Mother.

Yes, like I was in the lap of the Mother. I was so feel as if so comforted, so joyous. There was no restriction of any kind at all.

But sometimes she must have given answer that maybe you did not understand and then later on.

No, it did not happen like that. I think that I understood what she said. Because she said so clearly and so beautifully, it went straight into my heart.

Was there sometimes you're finding answers? Or decisions?

For example, there was one American lady who was a disciple of the Mother and she had written one letter saying that she was not able to find the money because she had to take the permission of her board. She was a very favorite woman from America and I had a great respect for her but Mother when I showed her that she had to take the permission of her board. She said something, she said it is humbug, something like that. That all members of the board are her own yes men. So what is the question of taking the permission of the board? But this is quite a surprising answer from the Mother and she spoke as if she was tearing off this whole idea that she could not send the money. In fact, I must tell you that with the Mother, she was happiest whenever anything was offered to her. This experience of mine, that our whole being should be offered to her entirely more and more and more and more. She was very happy with that.

Some people, I talked to, they said like Frederick and he said that when Mother looked at you, she recognized you, she knew exactly who you were.

Yes, of course it was understood. Actually, I was never surprised about it at all. I knew that she knew me more than anything else in the whole world, fully knew me very well, all my weaknesses, whatever I was.

I will narrate to you one or two or three experiences of mine when I was still there, but I had an opportunity of going to the Mother when the first commission of education came to meet the Mother and I was present at that time. And then she said to one of the members of the committee, “were the children of my school timid?”, answering her questions the lady in charge said “no, on the contrary, they are so bright and so forthcoming. And the poems which I had forgotten your children remember them so well from Keats and from Wordsworth and Shelly, they are extremely good students.” And Mother was very happy to see, she said, yes, she said, my children here, you know, when you see the children developing their muscles, you feel such a delight. And I feel very happy to hear these words that to see the children developing their muscles and to see the Mother is delighted when the children developed in that way.

Second time was one, Dr. Divakar who was a governor of Karnataka, he had come to visit our school as a commission from the government of India. And I saw that Mother was so kind, so gentle, first of all, she folded her hands and did namaste to him. He was a disciple and yet Mother was so gentle and then I was with her, standing with her and then she and I and Dr. Divakar went to Sri Aurobindo’s room and she took him to the whole of Sri Aurobindo’s room. And then she came out and then she sat in the room, her next room in the seat where she used to give afterwards Darshan days. And then she talked to him about the Center of Education and so on. This was the second visit, a second time when Commission of Education had come and I had the opportunity of meeting the Mother at that time.

Third time was when I had a visit of a few teachers from the country, from the side of the government of India and sent them here to see our school and I arranged the whole program. And when I went with them to the Mother, it was a wonderful experience for me because Mother looked at me for 15 minutes at a stretch. It was so marvelous that all the other teachers were surprised, they were all left out and as if the meeting was only for me. And for 15 minutes it was at a stretch without any wink of her eyes. She went on and on and on and on and on and on.

And there was another experience which I should narrate. You know I was in charge of all the boardings of the school and I used to give to the Mother on a previous day the date of the birthday of a given boarding. And once I made a mistake and gave a wrong date, six months earlier than the date of the real birth date. Now I was waiting that the people of the boarding will come first to meet me and then I will take them to the Mother. They could not, they did not turn up because it was not their birthday. So I realized that I made a mistake. Then I called all the children, I went to the boarding, I brought the person in charge of the boarding. I said, please come today as it’s your birthday. “It’s not my birthday!” Then I went to Pavitrada and I said, “I have made a terrible mistake and I have given a wrong date to the Mother”. So he said, “then what can I do?” I said, “please tell the Mother”. He said, “I won't tell the Mother”. One doesn't know what bombardment of what kind will be. Then I went to Vasudha Ben and I said, please tell the Mother. She said, “I won't tell the Mother”. Then I made myself bold to go to them Mother myself and I went and said to the Mother, “I wish that the whole earth may burst out so that I may go down. I made a big mistake, please pardon me.” And she was so kind, she was so kind, she looked at me and she said, but this is the birthday. This is the birthday, correct date, she said. And from now onward, this is the birthday, she said, she changed the birthdate of the boarding. And then she said, bring them all inside. I brought them inside. She was so kind, so kind. I have never seen such kindness anywhere in the world.

You used to go with children to see the Mother quite often, no?

Quite often not very often, but birthdays and so on.

• Could you tell us a bit of it?

No, children, Mother was very kind to everybody actually. I cannot tell you anything because my mind is so full of kindness of the Mother that I can only say that it is unsurpassable kindness on the earth. And she was so kind to everybody. So sweet, really the one we say, Douce Mere, sweet Mother, it is really a correct description of the Mother, Douce Mere. And I used to feel, I used to go to Delhi almost every year to bring the money for the government of India grant. And in 1966, when Indira Gandhi had become the Prime Minister of India, Mother had given me a work to get the recognition of the ashram, not the Centre of Education as a centre of yoga and education. So, there was no division between the Ashram and the Centre of Education. And I had written letter to Indira Gandhi. And I wanted to give it to Indira Gandhi, but through whom that was a question. I spoke to one of the members of parliament, who was a deputy leader of the parliament, Sundar Mohan Ghosh, who was the disciple of the Mother. He said, I will take the letter to Prime Minister. Then I happened to meet Dr. Karan Singh the same day. And I told him that this is the letter I have to give to Indira Gandhi. So he said, you give it to me, I shall give it to Indira Gandhi. Then I was in a kind of a dilemma to whom to give the letter. So I wrote to the Mother saying, this is the dilemma. So she sent me telegram. You give yourself to her. It was about 18th of February in that year. And 21st February was coming very soon. And I wanted to be here for the darshan on 21st February. But I couldn't get a chance to go to, I didn't get the appointment with the Prime Minister. So I wrote to the Mother saying that the time is now running out. So Mother sent me telegram: Persevere, love and blessings. She sent me telegram. Persevere. So then my meeting took place. Persevere. Persevere. So go on trying. So I got the chance only on 21st February. So I gave the letter to Indira Gandhi. Of course, the letter had a good fortune ultimately. And ultimately, Ashram was recognized as the centre of yoga and education. And it is a very useful letter. Mother even said to keep it very carefully.

So there was another experience also. Whenever I used to go to Delhi, it was my feast time because every day I used to report to the Mother of my efforts. And every day I used to receive telegram from the Mother, love and blessings. Every day. So sometimes I used to stay here for 15 days, 20 days. But every day I used to write a letter to the Mother and every day she used to reply to the telegram: Love and blessings.

So, there are so many crowded memories in my mind. But I will tell you two or three other things. One day I wrote a read out to her a message to the youth which I had written down. And she liked it very much. And she was very happy. And she said, that very evening there was a program here when Deputy Director General of UNESCO was to come here. So she said, you read out this speech over there in the Ashram theatre.

There was another occasion when I had prepared some kind of anthology of Sri Aurobindo’s action. And it was a long, long, long, long, long anthology of about 25 pages. And she had the patience to read, I read out to her and she had complete patience. And she read out and she said, put this paragraph here, a paragraph there and so on. And she minutely read it. And one day suddenly in September 1970 or 71, I told the Mother that I want to prepare a book for youth of India. So she said, that's a very good idea. Come from tomorrow, every evening she said. It was a kind of a great boon to me. And then I took my passages which I had chosen. And she said, first of all, refutation of materialism should be the first part. And then I had my program of reading out passages about sub-conscient, super-conscient and so she said, no, no, no. After the refutation of materialism, you come to supermind. So, I came to the conclusion that the Mother wants to tell the children of India, what is supermind. And I read out to her after every alternative evening. Because Nirodda in the meantime said that he wanted to read out to her a book that he was writing on Sri Aurobindo. So, Mother told me, she said, “I am now changing a little. Instead of coming every evening, you will come every alternative evening”. And then from the month of November, Tanmayada also was asked to come with me. And thereafter from the month of December January, some more teachers also used to come. And this went on up to 30th of March 1973. And every time we had some very.. some of the conversations are there in the collected works of the Mother. The very, very interesting answers which Mother used to give to all the teachers, two or three teachers like Jumur, who used to come sometime with us, Kitu used to come with us. And Tanmayada and myself.

Another experience which I would like to remember is, when I was preparing something about Sri Aurobindo’s action. And I told the Mother, I said that after having understood what Mother wants to do for India's solutions of the problems. I came to, I have a come to the conclusion that Auroville is the content of Sri Aurobindo’s action. And she said, yes, yes, it is true. And then I said that I have a great aspiration that there should be not only one Auroville, but Aurovilles all over the country, where there is no authority excepting the authority of the truth. And no allegiance except to the truth. And she was so pleased when I said these words. And she said, excellent, excellent, excellent. And then, Champakalalji was sitting there by, he was so enthused by this answer of the Mother. He stood up and said, Kirit, remember what Mother is saying. Now you print this answer of the Mother, thousands of copies and distribute all over the country. So it was a very memorable experience of mine.

What is the most important and the most striking thing that you remember that she told you about Auroville?

She said, she said, I have three steps of my action. My first action was the establishment of the Centre of Education. My second action is Auroville. My third action is Sri Aurobindo’s action. This is the most important thing because I was absolutely in my heart completely sure that Auroville is the part of the Mother's action on the earth. And I became absolutely sure. In fact, Auroville has always given me great enthusiasm right from the beginning. In fact, at one time when Auroville was being.. just some plots of land were bought. I had taken a bus with my students of the Centre of Education, some of them. And all the way from here to Auroville, we shouted, “we shall build Auroville”. And it was, as if your Mother was all the time here in my heart and she was giving me enthusiasm for Auroville.

When Auroville was to be inaugurated in 1968, 28th of February, in the month of January or so, Tanmayada and I wrote a letter to the Mother that we would like to offer some services to the development of the program of Auroville. So she said, it will be excellent, she wrote down in French. It will be excellent. Up till now, I had not told you to work for Auroville because, I thought that you are very busy with the schoolwork. But it will be very nice if Kirit takes a charge of all the youths who are coming for the inauguration. So from that day, I took charge of all the youths who were to come. And I have accommodated them, all of them in the houses of Ashram. And of course, I had taken the opportunity of taking them all to Auroville just about 9:30 or so. The time which was fixed for the inauguration and the Mother's offered message. Of course, there was some unpleasant moment on the previous day, which I will not narrate now here. But ultimately, it went off and I came to, the Mother rescued me actually from a very big problem. At one o'clock at night, I heard the Mother saying, go to Udhar for a solution of problem, which I was facing. And I went to Udhar at one o'clock at night, it was all closed. But in the morning, I went to his house and he was ready at five o'clock. And he arranged everything immediately and he answered my question. So I was able to come and I must say that our children of the school helped tremendously in the inauguration.

At one time, we had the idea that we should start Auroville school with some of the children of our school here in Auroville. But then there were some difficulties could not be done. And then when some people’s children were to be admitted to the school, I had taken the applications to the Mother. And Mother said, no, don't take them in our school. Let them start the school there. So that also gave me an indication that Mother wants to make a new experiment in education.

How would you explain to new people that Auroville is an adventure? How can you tell people that, that we deserve that?

Well, first of all, there is of course a goal which is prefixed in the sense that it's going to be a social collective organization, which will be a kind of a group which will respond to the Supramental manifestation. This goal was very clear to me, but how it will come about and there was hardly anything there, excepting a few plots of land. And one could have never imagined that Auroville would ever even come into existence. Because there was no money, there was no program, and no way of informing the world that we are now creating this. So it is an impossible thing, so it's nothing but an adventure, because without any preparation whatsoever, at least from my side, I can see that there was no preparation at all.

And I know how difficult was the time after Mother left her body. Auroville would have collapsed completely, and yet it is now going so strong. And yesterday I was reading Auroville Today, and I was reading the water resources and so on. It was so interesting to read that so much work is being done which is remarkable. And I bless the whole world that Auroville has been created and is continuing, it is existing. And I derive so much of happiness on the existence of Auroville. Every day is an adventure, I am quite sure that all of you who are living in Auroville, you have no program as it was something prefixed. It's all developing and growing and uncharted actually. So I really feel that it is an adventure of an unprecedented kind.

As Mr. Tata said, that here is one old lady sitting on one room, and she says something and young people of the world are coming here. He said, it's itself a miracle. How can it happen? Mr. Tata was a great helper to the development of Auroville.

Suppose you would speak to children who would come new to Auroville, because they are some children who come to Auroville. I mean their parents come and they come with their parents and they are six years old or eight years old. How would you tell them who was the Mother?

I would simply say that look at the whole universe, first of all, and imagine something more than universe. That was the Mother. Starting point of my answer to the children, look at the whole universe and imagine somebody who is greater than the universe. And that was the Mother. And even now she is their Mother. And as far as the powers of the Mother are concerned, well I know that any question that I put to her, even inordinately, is answered immediately. There is a time when I had the need of a teacher to be appointed, and the next day somebody would appear, and Mother would say, take this teacher to teach in the school. So, so, so, spontaneous and so easy. For everything there was a complete opening as it were, all questions are answered easily and smoothly without any difficulty at all. Smoothness is the one word I can use. Completely smooth, the Mother who is your friend, your teacher, your guide, and you are completely safe in her lap. This is what I would like to say to children. If you want a lap of complete smoothness and without any worry, think of the Mother and slide on at her feet and in her lap. All the problems are resolved.

Suppose, they asked you, but how can we enter in contact with her?

You just tell the Mother, I want to come into contact with you, and she will come, because you must remember that Mother is a servant of servants. I mean, she is a servant actually, always used to feel that she was supposed to serve you. It looks strange, my own experience of the Mother was that she wanted to help me and to serve me as much as possible and to the utmost extent. One day I was in this ministry of education and there was one difficult financial advisor who was blocking our grant. So I went to a room next to her, which was empty, it was a reception room, and I prayed to the Mother and I had a vision that Mother was signing that file. And then after five minutes that lady called me and said, I have signed already, I like your institution very much, she said to me. And she was the most difficult woman to deal with. But this is one experience of mine that I went to the next room, I prayed to the Mother and I said, the vision. So I am quite sure that Mother signed it actually. And after five minutes she called me and said, “I have signed it!”

So I would only tell the children, you just tell the Mother, Mother, I want to be in your lap and you will be in her lap. She answers immediately. Just as she answered my question, “Mother, I want to teach”. And the next day, Pavitrada who never knew me at all, he comes in looking for me. What an answer, immediate answer! As Mother said, every sincere prayer is answered immediately, instantaneously. And it is true to my experience, I had many many experience of this kind, where I just prayed and the answer was given. One day I went to Geneva and I said, I wish Anay was here. And Anay was there. And it is a fact: in Geneva, he was there to help me. And actually we typed out the first draft of the Auroville Act in Geneva. Of course, it will change afterwards several times. But this is how you can tell the children, any child wants to see the Mother, you can say, you tell the Mother, I want to see you, she will do something for you. And you will have satisfaction, that yes, you have seen. You ask the Mother, she will answer it. The only point is that we don't ask, we want to do ourselves, whatever, but we do not know how to ask the Mother.

But intensity must be so great, even here for example, I have come now in 2010, I came here. 2010, in February, on the 8th of February, I had a very intensive crisis. And I prayed to the Mother, Mother, Mother, please release me from this crisis. And then I had the vision. It was not a dream, but a vision. A vision in which I saw her distributing things in the playground to many people, the long line. And then in that line I was present, and then I knelt at the feet of the Mother, and she said to me, come away to the ashram. And then I came over here. So you might say that actually, I remained for two months more because I had some work to finish. But something again came and told me, today is the day when you should go. And the same day I left, and I came here. So this is how Mother is, even now, she's actively working.

And this is how you can tell the children that if you want to see the Mother, you ask, but ask sincerely. You must be sincere. Sincerity is the only thing that Mother wants. She wants seriousness, sincerity, and infinite reverence for the divine. Even for education, I think Mother has said, the deep reverence for the divine should be developed from childhood, among the children. It's a part of spiritual education you might say.