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FUTURES
Futures 39 (2007) 632643 www.elsevier.com/locate/futures

Auroville: A spiritual-social experiment in human unity and evolution

Rakesh Kapoor
Alternative Futures, B-177, East of Kailash, New Delhi 110 065, India Available online 18 December 2006

Abstract Inspired by the ideas of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, an international city of the future was set up in 1968 in southern India. Aurovilles mission is to be a universal town where men and women of all countries are able to live in peace and progressive harmony above all creeds, all politics and all nationalities. The purpose of Auroville is to realise human unity. The Matrimandir at the centre of the township is the symbolic and spiritual core of the city. This vibrant community of 1800 residents today has been experimenting and innovating for transformation that has three aspects: the spiritual, the social and the ecological. The origin of this fascinating experiment, the design of the township, the ecological restoration and greening carried out, the social and economic organisation of the Auroville community, its governance and its interaction with the neighbouring villages are described here. The manner and the extent to which the community attempts to live by its guiding ideas and principles are discussed. Finally, the reasons that make Auroville a radically transformative and futuristic initiative are discussed. r 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

There are very few expressions on earth at present that have Aurovilles level of aspiration. The challenge will be to keep it up. It is an incredible game that you are playingy Your joy, as Aurovilians, will have to be in the transitionbecause the owering of this place will probable be several generations down the line Ram Dass ([1], p. 145). [Auroville is] an expression of a new kind of human consciousness that we will need to survive in the world. The world has to become a multi-cultural worldand more sensitivey [It is] one of the hopeful monsters as they are termed. They are monsters
Tel.: +91 11 2684 7668.

E-mail address: rakeshkapoor@airtelbroadband.in. 0016-3287/$ - see front matter r 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.futures.2006.10.009

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for the previous generation but they will be the new species when that generation disappears Ervin Laszlo ([1], p.142). 1. The birth of Auroville In the words of the Mother, who conceived of this township to give concrete shape to Sri Aurobindos ideas of human evolution, Auroville is a place of accelerated evolution where man begins to change his world by the power of the inner spirit. With the blessings of the Mother the Sri Aurobindo Society, along with the Indian government, approached the United Nations for support and in 1966 UNESCO passed a resolution giving their acceptance and support to this unique project. Auroville came into being on 28 February 1968, near Pondicherry in southern India, when young people representing 124 countries and all the Indian states placed a handful of earth from their home lands in a marble-clad urn near the site of the Matrimandir, at the centre of Auroville, symbolising the creation of the city. Also placed inside the urn was the Auroville charter, given by the Mother, which lays down the raison detre of Auroville [3]: (1) Auroville belongs to nobody in particular. Auroville belongs to humanity as a whole. But to live in Auroville one must be a willing servitor of the Divine Consciousness. (2) Auroville will be the place of an unending education, of constant progress and a youth that never ages. (3) Auroville wants to be the bridge between the past and the future. Taking advantage of all discoveries from without and from within, Auroville will boldly spring towards future realisations. (4) Auroville will be a site of material and spiritual researches for a living embodiment of an actual Human Unity. Located near the seacoast, in Tamil Nadu, a few kilometres north of Pondicherry, Auroville is now a community of 1780 people (1367 adults and 413 minors) from 35 countries, including 736 of Indian origin as per the latest ofcial census of November 2005 [2]. The city is a circular area of 2.5 km diameter, surrounded by a (planned but yet incomplete) green belt. In the middle of the city is the Matrimandirthe sacred, grand dome structure that is the spiritual and symbolic core of the city. The Auroville community consists of about 100 settlements, which, between them, own over half the total land in the area. The remaining land belongs to 13 Tamil villages, with a population of about 40,000. The conception of Auroville is grand and futuristic, no doubt. But even more interesting and remarkable has been the journey of the last 38 yearshow Auroville, inspired by the ideas of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, has taken shape as a dynamic, continuously experimenting, international, multi-cultural community responding both to its external physical and social environment and to the spiritual quest. It is not as if this community has achieved the ideals and the standards that the Mother laid down. In many ways, the community is far from achieving those goals, but the process, the experimentation, the attempt to move in that direction is very much alive. The community is constantly searching for ways to overcome the problems of social life and human nature, the contradictions and dilemnas that it encounters daily.

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Box 1 The dream that inspired Auroville. There should be somewhere upon earth a place that no nation could claim as its sole property, a place where all human beings of good will, sincere in their aspiration, could live freely as citizens of the world, obeying one single authority, that of the supreme Truth: a place of peace, concord, harmony, where all the ghting instincts of man would be used exclusively to conquer the causes of his suffering and misery, to surmount his weakness and ignorance, to triumph over his limitations and incapacities; a place where the needs of the spirit and the care for progress would get precedence over the satisfaction of desires and passions, the seeking for pleasures and material enjoymentsyWork would not be there as the means of gaining ones livelihood, it would be the means where by to express oneself, develop ones capacities and possibilities, while doing at the same time service to the whole group, which on its side would provide for each ones subsistence and for the eld of his work.In brief, it would be place where relations between human beings, usually based almost exclusively upon competition and strife, would be replaced by relations of emulation for doing better, for collaboration relations of real brotherhood. The Mother

In 1954, the Mother wrote the following text, which has become a source of inspiration for Auroville [4] (Box 1). 2. From barren earth to oasis The rst thing that strikes a visitor about Auroville is the greenery, serenity and beauty of the place. When the rst Aurovilians came here, the land was barren, scarred by gullies and ravines created by wind and soil erosion. Only a few palm, mango, neem and banyan trees dotted the landscape. The sea would become brown after the heavy monsoon rains due to the washing away of the red laterite soil. The regeneration of this degraded environment was the foremost concern of the initial settlers in Auroville. They went about their task with such zeal and idealism that today instead of the dying, barren land, there are tree-lined avenues and a soothing green environment. Since the beginning, over two million trees have been planted to stabilise and refertilise the soil, canyons have been dammed and hundreds of elds bunded to prevent water run-off. And constant progress with regard to the natural environment continues: the Aurovilians are constantly working on soil and water conservation, reforestation, sustainable agriculture, and the promotion of renewable energy and appropriate building technologies. The reforestation work has tried to protect biodiversity and propagate the original indigenous species. Two thousand and ve hundred acres of the remnant patches of the tropical dry evergreen forest (TDEF) have been protected and seeds from these patches are regularly collected and propagated in Auroville. It is estimated that from an initial 20 species, today 300 species have been planted, half of these being indigenous species.

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Palmyra, an Auroville centre set up in 1990, has been working on land reclamation issues, with help from the National Wastelands Development Board and other agencies. Another organisation within Auroville, Water Harvest, is working to revive the erys, a traditional system of irrigation tanks that were used to harvest rainwater but had fell into disuse during the colonial period. While the restoration, desilting and repair of many of these ponds has been done, it is now planned to create a system of these tanks in the whole of the Kaliveli watershed, the bioregion to which Auroville belongs. Two Auroville centres involved in environmental work, Shakti and Pitchandikulam Bioresource Centre, are among the 16 sites in Southern India recognised and supported as Medicinal Plant Conservation Parks by the Foundation for the Revitalisation of Local Health Traditions. These two centres maintain in situ ethno-botanical parks and medicinal plant gardens with more than 120 indigenous species. A spin-off from this was a new interest in recreating the original ecosystem of the area, which was now referred to as TDEF. Dr. Meher-Homji of the French Institute compiled a list of 266 plant species which he considered belonged to the TDEF and green-workers like Joss, Jaap and Walter, who already had considerable knowledge of local species, made frequent visits to remnant indigenous groves to collect seeds to propagate in Auroville nurseries. Auroville landworkers, in conjunction with Village Action, have run courses for local farmers in organic agriculture and have introduced kitchen gardens into the villages [5]. In 1993, the AuroEco-Dat service was set up by the Auroville Greenwork Resource Centre to document ecological datasuch as species lists of plants, birds, etc.on the Auroville bioregion. Besides the soothing greenery, the landscape of Auroville is dotted with picturesque buildings, often built with mud, and with windmills. Very apt symbols for the pioneering work that Aurovilians have done in renewable energy, appropriate building technology and wastewater treatment. The Centre for Scientic Research (CSR) and the Building Centre (AV-BC) are two main organisations doing this work. For instance, Auroville has over a hundred houses that use only solar energy through photovoltaic panels and another few dozen houses that use solar power in conjunction with a grid connection. A large number of the self-constructed houses are either made out of compressed mud bricks or recycled material or other natural materials. The solar kitchen, which can provide meals for up to 1000 people, cooks food, using steam generated by a solar concentrator, which is one of the worlds biggest. It focuses the suns rays continually on a cylindrical boiler by means of a computerised tracking device. At Matrimandir, a stand-alone 37 KW solar power plant has been built. Consisting of 484 PV panels of 75 W each, this provides the energy for the lighting needs of the Matrimandir and the surrounding gardens and can store enough energy to provide for 2 days requirements in case of cloudy weather. 3. How Auroville functions The 1780 residents are from diverse cultural, national, educational and economic backgrounds. Indians, French and Germans are the largest groups, and nearly threefourths of the Indians are local Tamilians who have opted to formally join the Auroville Township. Most of those who seek entry into and ultimately join Auroville rst come here on visits to explore the place. An entry group regulates the admission of new members, based on their psychological-spiritual inclinations and, in case of non-Indians, other procedural-legal requirements.

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The spontaneity with which many of the Auroville residents have come and settled here, the almost mysterious attraction with which Auroville has drawn them is interesting. For instance, Tania from Uzghorod, in the former USSR came across some translated works of Sri Aurobindo through her brother at Leningrad University. This had been done illegally. The translations had been copied by hand or on old typewriters, and were circulated as sacred and very precious documents. They opened a door deep down in me. Somebody had given answers to basic questions of life. Then, one day in 1988, when she read an article about Auroville in the local paper of the communist youth union, it became her dream. And soon, she ew down and arrived in Auroville. Entering Auroville felt like entering a vibrating presence. For months I stayed indoors, getting used to that vibration, the climate and all those Indians and other foreigners. They did not wear white clothes, but there was often an unusual depth to the people I metthe Russians rst, of course, as I hardly spoke English. The experience was overwhelming, and it became clear that Auroville was my path [6]. Tania faced resistance from her people back in the Ukraine who did not want her to go to Auroville. But thanks to her daughter Olgas persistence, she returned to Auroville and has been living there for the last 12 years. 3.1. Social organisation and unending education Joining this community is, understandably, a bold decision. For, in keeping with its purpose, choosing to be a member of Auroville requires one to abandon old certitudes and notions, and participate in a social-spiritual adventure. For instance, one has to leave behind the notion of property. Many of the Aurovilians who had the resources have built houses (some small and simple, others elaborate and spacious, but nearly always beautiful) but it is not their property. The houses belong to the community, which allocates these to those who need them. In the last few years, in fact, there has been a housing shortage, and this is one of the reasons the community has grown very slowly. Ultimately, this city of the future is intended for 50,000 residents, which the Mother considered sufcient to allow this experiment in human unity to take on its full dimension. Once someone opts to join Auroville and is accepted, he or she joins one of the existing settlements, nds work and participates in the community.1 The individual is considered a newcomer for 1 year before his or her place as a full member of the community is conrmed. Interestingly, however, there are very few intentioned communities in Auroville. In the other residential settlements, the community may be little more than a neighbourhood, except that all residents share a broadly similar spiritual orientation. Verite, French for truth, is one such intentioned community, which comprises eight permanent members. Spread over 14 acres, this community has two meditation halls, shares a common kitchen and dining area, a vegetable garden and the services of 14 hired workers, although the members of the community have their own dwelling units. These may be elaborate, or simple, like a thatched hut, which is Bhavanas house. Bhavana, American by origin, has been here for well over three decades, and is actively associated with the Auroville Village Action Group (AVAG), which works for development of the neighbourhood villages. This
The basic particulars of each community are available on the Auroville website ([2], section on housing and communities).
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community uses only solar and wind power, operates a common fund and the members jointly manage the affairs of the community. The most important aspect of the community, however, is the inner meeting every Monday or Tuesday evening, where the members share their spiritual experiences over the week. Work in Auroville is, more than anything else, a mode of self-expression. Individuals opt for the kind of work that they have an inclination for and wish to do, and not necessarily work that they may have been formally trained for. For instance, Tency Baetens, originally from Belgium, the chief executive of the CSR is not an engineer by training. But through his centre he has been promoting renewable energy, building with ferro-cement and experimenting with systems of wastewater treatment with commendable zeal. One of the obvious contradictions that one comes across in Auroville is the fact that the community is inspired by the ideals of human unity, the highest values and the quest for perfection to go beyond the human to the supramental state, yet the residents of Auroville are characterised by an extreme individualism.2 Residents who have lived here for decades say that the only thing that is strictly taboo here is the use of drugs to alter states of consciousness. It is also notable, however, that the individualism of its residents does not lead to anarchy, perhaps because it is tempered by the spiritual nature and objectives of the community. There is a great diversity of methods in which Aurovilians work on their inner selves (at times even deviating from the method suggested by Sri Aurobindo), as evident from discussions with them and from the news, views and ideas that regularly appear in the weekly newsletter (News and notes) and the journals published by Auroville (which can mostly be accessed through the websitewww.auroville.org). A very positive aspect, however, is that where weaknesses and problems are perceived, these are openly voiced and discussed. (See, for instance, the various testimonies and interviews in [1] and in the subsequent issues of Auroville today.) The socio-economic organisation of Auroville reects the opposing pulls of individualism and communitarian organisation. The manner in which work, livelihood and nances are organised is not easy for an outsider to understand. But the principle of this organisation is clear: to provide for the basic needs of all while giving everybody a chance to contribute to the work of the community, and, more important, the chance to work upon ones inner self. Another notion that takes on completely new meaning here is education. There are no classes, no grades, no certicates, no xed syllabus, no uniformity among the few dozen schools in the city. Some of the schools are for the Aurovilians, the others for the children in the 13 neighbouring villages. As the Mother wrote, In this place, children would be able to grow and develop integrally without losing contact with their souls; education would be given not for passing examinations or obtaining certicates and posts but to enrich existing faculties and bring forth new ones. And education is intended not only for the children. Unending education and constant progress for all is the norm. Sri Aurobindo and the Mother see man as a multi-layered being composed of the physical, vital and emotional, mental, psychic and spiritual personalities. There is within man a spark of the transcendent divine, and the aim of human existence is to become
It is to this challenge that the spiritual guru Ram Dass referred in 1993, when he said, I sense that you are leading parallel rather than interactive livesthat you are into community but not communal living, and I wonder if the power of the contract between you is strong enough to overcome the divisiveness of your personal lives ([1], p. 144). These words are still equally relevant.
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conscious of this reality and unite with it.3 Each human being has his/her unique path to arrive at this union, and this can be done in life, in matter itself, and not by removing oneself from life as advocated by traditional spiritual practices. The movement of each individual on his/her path to self-perfection and growth in consciousness is what constitutes the living unending education of Aurovilians [10] (Box 2). However, achieving the Mothers vision of education without any certicates are also going to be difcult, going by the experience until now. Most parents in Auroville are not ready to foreclose options for their children by staying completely away from conventional mainstream education. 3.1.1. AVAG An important concern of the Auroville community has been the welfare of the villages falling within the township. AVAG is Aurovilles village outreach wing and some Aurovilians are very active in it. Operating since l983, it was registered as a trust in 2000, and is managed by a team of ve trustees working in collaboration with about 50 local people trained as social workers. It touches a population of about 70,000 in 75 surrounding villages. Thanks to the work of AVAG, today villagers are successfully availing of government programs, and projects offered by other NGOs in health environmental regeneration and womens development. Other important activities of AVAG include the The Isai Ambalam Research School and a Life Education Centre for girls who learn typing, tailoring, needlework, and cooking, with remedial work in literacy, and orientation toward womens role in society. Started in 1982, Isai Ambalam School initially catered to the learning needs of 815 year-olds, who were considered dropouts from other learning establishments, and who came from villages in the immediate Auroville area. Today, however, it has pre-school, primary and young adult sections, and these sections are divided into seven groups. It has 115 students and 12 teachers, and is providing for the students to receive education up to 8th and 10th standard levels. For the last few years the school has been specialising in conducting experiments in education by adopting innovative and comprehensive educational methods, which make learning easier, faster, more joyous and context oriented. Many of these methods have been effectively and successfully used elsewhere in and outside India. The AVAG also organises cultural activities between Auroville and the villages. 3.2. The economy The principles for the economy of Auroville laid down by The Mother are very much on the lines of communist idealfrom each according to his ability, to each according to his need, although she never referred to this term. These principles include the fact that there will be no personal possessions, the township will be self-supporting, that the city will provide for each individuals subsistence and sphere of action and that it will have money relations only with the outside world.4 The Auroville community has evolved and experimented with various systems and measures to deal with economic necessities. The
The Life Divine is the most elaborate statement of Sri Aurobindos philosophy [7]. A brief statement of his teaching and his method of integral yoga can be found at [8] and [9]. 4 The Mother, quoted in Carel [12]. Carel provides an excellent overview of how the Auroville economy has evolved over the years and the dilemnas it faces as against the ideals put down by the Mother.
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Box 2 To be a true Aurovilian [11]. (1) The rst necessity is the inner discovery in order to know what one truly is behind social, moral, cultural, racial and hereditary appearances. At the centre there is a being free, vast and knowing, who awaits our discovery and who ought to become the active centre of our being and our life in Auroville. (2) One lives in Auroville in order to be free from moral and social conventions; but this freedom must not be a new slavery to the ego, to its desires and ambitions. The fullment of ones desires bars the way to the inner discovery, which can only be achieved in the peace and transparency of perfect disinterestedness. (3) The Aurovilian should lose the sense of personal possession. For our passage in the material world, what is indispensable to our life and to our action is put at our disposal according to the place we must occupy. The more we are consciously in contact with our inner being, the more are the exact means given to us. (4) Work, even manual work, is something indispensable for the inner discovery. If one does not work, if one does not put ones consciousness into matter, the latter will never develop. To let the consciousness organise a bit of matter by means of ones body is very good. To establish order around oneself helps to bring order within oneself. One should organise ones life not according to outer and articial rules, but according to an organised inner consciousness, for if one lets go on without subjecting it to the control of the higher consciousness, it becomes ckle and inexpressive. It is to waste ones time in the sense that matter remains without conscious utilisation. (5) The whole earth must prepare itself for the advent of the new species, and Auroville wants to work consciously to hasten this advent. (6) Little by little it will be revealed to us what this new species must be, and in the meanwhile the best course it to consecrate oneself entirely to the Divine. The Mother

Newcomers joining the community as well as settled Aurovilians contribute a monthly amount towards the common services that the city provides them. There is also a one-time repatriation contribution made by non-Indians joining the community. Those working in commercial or service units receive a monthly living or maintenance allowance, which is credited to an account with the Auroville Maintenance Fund. This account is debited for the purchases the individual makes in the Pour Tous, the Auroville central store and for various bills and cash withdrawals. Again, one issue here has been that those running or working in commercial projects are able to get a bigger allowance than those providing community services, whose maintenance allowance is provided by the community.

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The community is supposed to be self-supporting through over a hundred production and commercial units (handicrafts, building construction, information technology, etc.) located in the industrial zone (one of the four zones of the city). These units are supposed to contribute a part of their prots to the Auroville central fund, but apparently only 40% of the units are protable enough to do so [12]. A bigger source of funds for the township as compared to the internal generation of funds through commercial activities is donations received by well-wishers in India and all over the world. For example, of the total receipts of approximately Rs. 33 crores (Rs. 330 million or US$ 6,875,000) in 2001, the percentage break down of inows is: internal generation 18%, foreign sources 56%, Indian sources 26%. These donations and grants received are directed towards all major activities of Auroville: building Matrimandir (10.38%), purchasing land (4.25%), education (9.06%), maintaining Aurovilians (22.25%) and balance towards other activities combined [13]. One major impact of the weaknesses on the economic front is that the community can manage to grow in size very gradually. A White Paper on the Auroville economy presented in 2002 calculated that the economic carrying capacity of the township had actually declined by 20% during 199399. The paper suggested a number of measures by the Auroville Foundation Governing Board and other agencies if the goal of expanding the township to minimally ve thousand people is to be achieved rapidly [12]. The community has made many efforts to provide employment, literacy, health care etc. to the 13 villages in and around Auroville, and to involve the villagers in wasteland reclamation and such other activities. Many of the villagers are dalits or belong to backward classes, and about half are illiterate. The Auroville Village Action Group has been engaged in development programmes for these villages. The impact of these programmes, however, is limited, given the socio-economic background of the villages. This, no doubt, will be another challenge and a site of material and spiritual researches that will be with the Auroville community for a long time to come. 3.3. How Auroville is governed The township is currently governed under Auroville Foundation Act with three different bodiesthe Governing Board, the International Advisory Council and the Residents Assemblyhaving a role in governance. When it began in 1968, it was a project of the Sri Aurobindo Society. After the passing away of the Mother in 1973, the Auroville community came in conict with the parent organisation, which wanted to keep nancial control over the project. Aurovilians felt that this went against the spirit of the Auroville charter. Responding to requests from the Auroville community, the government temporarily took over its management. In 1988, the autonomous Auroville Foundation was created by the Auroville Foundation Act passed by the Indian Parliament (Box 3).5 4. The city of the future? At the centre of Auroville, both physically and spiritually, stands the nearly completed Matrimandir, the soul of Auroville. Matrimandir, the Mother stated, is to teach people that it is not by retiring from this world nor by ignoring it that they will realise the
5

This is a slightly modied version based on ([1], p. 101).

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Box 3 The Auroville Foundation Act: A Resume. All assets related to Aurovillepreviously held by various legal entities were taken over by the Foundation for the better management and further development of Auroville in accordance with its Charter. The Act created three authorities: the Governing Board, the International Advisory Council and the Residents Assembly. (In addition, a Working Committee was to be created to assist the Residents Assembly.) It also specied that there will be a secretary. The managerial powers of the Foundation rest primarily with the Governing Board, which has to promote the ideals of Auroville, to review and approve basic policies and programmes, to secure the proper management of all properties, to prepare the master plan and coordinate the fund raising. Most of these powers are to be executed in consultation with the Residents Assembly.The powers of the Residents Assembly are merely to advise the Governing Board or to make proposals for the approval of the Governing Board. But there is one important exception: it has the exclusive power to decide upon admission of new residents or termination of residence.The International Advisory Council only has an advisory role. When giving advice to the Governing Board, the Council will try to ensure that the ideals for which Auroville has been established are encouraged, and the residents of Auroville are allowed freedom to develop activities and institutions for the fullment of the aspirations and programmes envisaged in the Charter.

Divine during their life. The Mother had a vision at the beginning of 1970 about the inner chamber of the Matrimandir and she subsequently spelt out these ideas about the design layout and purpose of the inner chamber in her talks. The outer design of the structure was selected subsequently by her from among various models that were presented to her in 1970. Started on 21st February 1971, construction work on this structure has continued uninterruptedly ever since. The inner chamber of Matrimandir, a place for silence and concentration, has been completed and, at present, the work focuses on nishing the outer structure and creating the surrounding gardens. Although work on the structure started in 1971, its elaborateness, perfection and the immense effort (and money) going into constructing this grand symbol is such that it is still not complete. The cost of this structure, when complete, is expected to be more than Rs. 250 million. It will use about 20 kg of gold, which, in the form of gold leaf, is painstakingly sandwiched between glass and the breglass discs, to be ultimately mounted on the dome. One cannot but notice the dedication and meticulousness with which the team working at Matrimandir workshop and Auroville go about their task, inspired by the Mothers vision: The Matrimandir wants to be the symbol of the Divines answer to mans aspiration for perfection. Union with the Divine manifesting in a Progressive human unity. The original plan of the city was conceived in the shape of a spiral galaxy to symbolise humankinds evolving existence, with four zones radiating out from the Matrimandir gardens: the International, Cultural, Residential and Industrial zones. The Green Belt will

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eventually surround the entire city area. While much of the land still has to be purchased, Auroville presently manages about three-quarters of the total acreage within the future city area, and about 25% within the Green Belt. The present community of Auroville consists of some 100 settlements of varying sizes. Auroville has created a basic infrastructure of roads, water and electricity supply, and telecommunications, including an electronic communications network. Accommodation has been constructed for 1500 people, and municipal services for food production, purchase and distribution, electricity and water supply, waste disposal and recycling, education, health care, nancial transactions, and town planning have been established. The Auroville Township Master Plan 200025, which has been recently endorsed by the Government of India, is dedicated to the challenge of creating an environment-friendly, sustainable urban settlement that, at the same time, integrates and cares for the neighbouring rural area. The surrounding Green Belt is intended as a fertile zone for applied research in the sectors of food production, forestry, soil conservation, water management, waste management and other aspects of sustainable development. The results of such innovative methods would be available for application in both rural and urban areas in India and the world [14]. Ironically, the greening of Auroville is itself the cause of one of the main problems Auroville is facing. The beautiful environment has attracted land sharks, who are buying up land in the neighbouring villages for speculative purposes. By the year 2003, the appreciation in land prices had been almost 500% in the last 10 years [14]. This has made it so much more difcult for the township to acquire the remaining land within the city area and the surrounding green belt that is needed in the long run for the city to develop in accordance with the original vision. Besides, designing and planning for the city of 50,000 people in an ecologically sustainable way is itself a major challenge, and will require all the ingenuity and organisational skills that the city can muster. 5. Why Auroville is a radically transformative initiative Despite all its limitations and the somewhat slow pace at which the Auroville community has been able to grow, there are a number of reasons why it is a radically transformative, futuristic initiative. First, Auroville springs from the philosophy of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, which considers man as a transitional being, containing within him the seeds of a higher being. The important thing is that this philosophy has not remained only on paperit has inspired thousands to take part in an active experiment with life and has inspired millions of others to support and encourage this experiment. Auroville is the living embodiment of the supramental questit is the bridgehead to a new plane of consciousness. Second, it is a unique experiment for human unity. Auroville is a living willing community of people who have come together irrespective of nationality, race, religion, culture and creed to embark towards future realisations. Third, it is a constantly experimenting and innovating community consisting of very conscious and energetic individuals.6 It is really a place for unending education and a
6 Imagine: some two thousand residents, speaking different languages, coming from different educational backgrounds, different (karmic) ages and cultures, all of them strong individuals (otherwise they would have left for an easier place long ago), all steadily projecting their hopes, ideas and aws on each other, and all called by a

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community that seeks to take advantage of all discoveries from without and from within. Fourth, Auroville is a holistic community that engages with all aspects of social and personal life. In its quest for the divine, it does not run away from the world, but engages with every aspect of it. The Auroville community has worked on the physical environment, the social environment and the inner being to simultaneously seek the transformation of self, society and ecology, and thus to seek the transformation of the human being himself.7 Fifth, in the process of transformation, Auroville demands radical choices from its members. It is a difcult path, and many may not succeed much, but it requires courage and deep conviction and commitment to even embark on this adventure. Acknowledgement Besides Aurovilles rich website, which includes the weekly newsletter News and notes, and other journals published by the Auroville community, this paper draws upon an earlier article I wrote [15] based on a visit to Auroville in late 1999. References
[1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] The Auroville adventure: selections from ten years of Auroville today, Auroville today, Auroville, 1998. www.auroville.org/society. http://www.sriaurobindosociety.org.in/subnav/aurovil.htm. www.miraura.org/aa/av/av-adream.html. Carel, An environmental community? Auroville today, November 2003. /http://www.auroville.org/ journals&media/avtoday/Nov_2003/environment.htmS Mama, you are Shakti, Auroville today, February 2006. /http://www.auroville.org/journals&media/ avtoday/Feb_2006/Mama_Shakti.htmS. Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine, First edition 193940, Fifth edition, Sri Aurobindo Ashram, Pondicherry, 1970. Sri Aurobindo, The integral yoga: Sri Aurobindos teaching and method of practice, Sri Aurobindo Ashram, Pondicherry, 1993 The introduction to this volume, in Sri Aurobindos own words, can also be found (Sri Aurobindos teaching and method of sadhana) at /http://www.auroville.org/vision/sriauroteaching.htmS. http://www.auroville.org/vision/integralyoga.htm. http://www.auroville.org/education/overview_edu.htm. http://www.auroville.org/vision/tobeatrueavlian.htm. Carel, Economic research and developments, Auroville today, November 2003. /http://www.auroville.org/ journals&media/avtoday/Nov_2003/economy.htmS. Funds and Assets Management Committee (FAMC), Surviving, not growing, Auroville today, January 2003. /http://www.auroville.org/journals&media/avtoday/jan_03/surviving.htmS. http://www.auroville.org/thecity. R. Kapoor, Accelerated evolution, Humanscape (2000).

[9] [10] [11] [12] [13] [14] [15]

(footnote continued) vision none as yet can attain! The result is a highly charged, intense energy eld, a perpetual dance of communication, with high notes and low notes, and all possible gradations in between ([2], section on Conscious living). 7 In the light of this high vision underlying Auroville, the internal dynamics of the township are set in such a way that all its residents are under constant pressure to exceed themselves, to continually seek self-perfection [10].