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*Open Letter to the Governing Board, by Jean Yves, August 15, 2003:
“Dear Members of the Governing Board,
Arjun’s letter of June 21
st
raised important points which have not yet been taken
into consideration, the style of the letter having distracted the readers from its
contents. But we can always go to the quieter enquiries of reason and dig up more
deeply and precisely the issues that are at stake; since Auroville is a place for
research, it is as a researcher that I would like to invite you, by this open letter, to
some fundamental questioning.
Auroville being a society in the making and not only a legal body, the central
question of its polity lies in the process of legitimation: how do you make decisions
legitimate? Throughout history, two ways have been tried out and combined: the
transcendent authority of the word of God (or of Science) and the general will of
the people. The key to unite the people lies in the transcendent, this stock of living
values they agree to believe in, to implement in their collective life or, better, to
become in their inner and outer nature. The sensitive point has always been to
determine who possesses this transcendent word, or how it has to be interpreted.
Auroville has a unique feature, which makes of it a real beginning for a new way of
making a society: the Truth the Mother refers to as its foundation is to be
discovered experimentally and not imposed from above by the mind. And this Truth
is not exclusive but all-inclusive, synthetic and capable therefore to harmonise what
seems to be divergent or antagonist. Therefore our capacity to harmonise and
synthesise our antagonisms will give us the exact measure of our realisation of
Auroville’s ideals. It is this feature which makes Auroville a unique experiment in
Human Unity, for if all the conflicting values cannot be reconciled in a
comprehensive view, if one has to win over and suppress the others, then human
unity is impossible, at least in a progressive and harmonious way. The process of
harmonisation by mutual inclusion is therefore one of our most central guidelines, I
would say a strategic value in our development policies.
In the Matrimandir issue, the Governing Board has decided to invalidate it. Even the
very precise and relevant statement of the Mother about Matrimandir work, saying
that Paolo and Roger should work together and why (Mother’s Agenda, 31-12-69)
has been ignored. Incapable therefore of including the Matrimandir Workers Team’
views and to combine them with Roger’s approach, or to invite Aurovilians to do so
in fidelity to their law of development, it had to go for legal means in order to
impose a unilateral exclusive view, far more simple to deal with. But all the legal
means of the world cannot abrogate the Mother’s guidelines that are available to
every Aurovilian and which make Auroville so unique, and the Governing Board’s
decisions will appear more and more as based on an illegitimate ground, therefore
undermine at the outset, which is not a healthy situation. Moreover, we will have
the issue of the Matrimandir Gardens for years on our table, because no true
solution has been found. If you doubt it, just imagine the situation once it has been
settled that a huge lake will be there: its realisation will be stuck in its financial
dimensions and technical incertitude, and will only leave an empty space around
Matrimandir, as also time for endless discussions without prospect of practical
solutions, and without any method of reconciliation, since the only one that was
given to us by the Mother had been rejected.