Where on earth is Auroville and why?

I once visited utopia in the 1970s It looked like nothing yoursquod imagine Twenty or so square kilometres of scorchingly hot barren moonscape about 100 kms south of Chennai near what was then Pondicherry The earth was parched and red from oxide nothing grewmdash except I realised quickly the hopes and dreams of those who had come from far countries to live hereIt was impossible for a young man in his 20s not to be swept away by what was unfolding there I visited there on my own dime repeatedly wanting to be on the sidelines of this extraordinary experiment in human evolutionThe city was called Auroville after Sri Aurobindo Ghosh the seer whose revolutionary thoughts had inspired it It was in India but not Indian it was a place where people of all creeds nationalities were to conduct an epic experiment to reach the next stage of human evolution It was to be a demonstration project of how humans could live together in peace and harmony responding to a higher divinity It was the world John Lennon described when he sang Imagine beyond politics class materialism greed and chaosMy first visit there was thrilling The Aurovillians I met were building a futuristic frontier world with wallless houses they had built with their own hands Private property was banned no one could own anything Money was disparaged as the root of all evil and drugs were banned Everyone was supposed to follow a ldquodivine purposerdquomdashbut following a specific religion was discouragedIt was a vibrant place Someone was teaching Taichi someone else was finding ways to harness solar power to electrify their hut The community had many Indians but I met French Italian German Scandinavian American and other nationalities Discussions were loud controversial electrifying Everyone had something to say and everyone was open to being challenged Amity ruled the dayI visited Auroville on and off over 10 years making many friends But now over 30 years have passed I woke up this morning with questionsmdashwhatever became of those humans who went there to evolve to the next level of consciousness Why do we never hear of Auroville or its solutions for better ways to live togetherWhere is the crucible of higher consciousness in this blighted time when we need it mostAlthough it was meant to be a city of about 50000 there are only 3000 souls in todayrsquos Auroville They are mostly white and you could be forgiven for wondering if theyrsquove forgotten what they went there for You might mistake it for a modern commune with organic farming and its own cottage industries making soaps and incense Some even nod towards lsquowomenrsquos empowermentrsquo by employing local Tamil women to produce handicrafts for exportAuroville came into being in a postcolonial world tired of hypocrisy militarism politics and materialism Hippies communes kibitzes and ashrams were aacute la mode but thatrsquos not what Auroville wanted to be It had a charter and a defined spiritual goalmdashbut alas back then it really did not have any rigorous screening of those who applied to be part of that experimentAs a result geniuses and artists came but also drifters and lost souls Divisions started with people like those Even in the years when I visited there the Italians had their own enclave as did the French European animosities were imported along with the Europeans And many of them had not expected that spiritual growth included cleaning your own toilets and ploughing your fieldsIn response the seekers who moved there did what colonisers have always done through timemdashthey employed local labour for menial work and farming After all you canrsquot grow your spirit if your day goes in feeding your bodyWe are a doomed species of a planet dying from our own depredations Auroville could have been a petri dish from which ideas and ideals for more luminous living diffused into the planet but Auroville instead became an islandmdashand one no one talks about any more By many accounts Aurovillians feared that too much contact with the corrupt world they had left behind would sully them kill their creativity and defeat their purpose They became attached to their cleverness and ingenious solutionsRemarkable experiments and innovations were born in Auroville one of the newer ones being an appbased form of cash that depreciates by 9 per cent daily unless you spend it The desert they were given is now an Eden Where once a few cashews and bracken stood are lush forests and robust water management systemsWhether or not Auroville is where the next big spiritual leap will happen there is no doubt that it could be a game changer in a world being devastated by climate change If only they would realise that they are not a new species of human but the one that needs to be savedHere viewed from there C Y Gopinath in Bangkok throws unique light and shadows on Mumbai the city that raised him You can reach him at cygopigmailcomSend your feedback to mailbagmiddaycomThe views expressed in this column are the individualrsquos and donrsquot represent those of the paper