Amal-Kiran - Poet and Critic

"Hail to thee, blithe Spirit!"

I FIRST came to Pondicherry in 1934 to do business in partnership with Mr. Robert Gaebele. I came from Bombay where one of my friends was Homi Sethna. When he knew that I was going to Pondicherry he told me that his cousin, Kekushru, was there at some Ashram and that I should meet him as he knew that we would become friends. And he was right. I got in touch with Kekushru at once and we became good friends. He then told me something about the Sri Aurobindo Ashram, about Sri Aurobindo and The Mother. I had known a little about Ashrams as in my home town there was a sort of Ashram, a Mutt of Arud Swamy which I had visited. What Amal told me was very interesting and I began to have a great respect for both the gurus. The name of Amal Kiran was given to Kekushru by Sri Aurobindo and it means "The Clear Ray" and he is known as Amal to all his friends.

Amal had been stricken with polio at a very young age and his parents tried their best, and even took him abroad for treatment as one of his legs was almost paralysed and he walked with a limp. But he could not be completely cured of it and he bore his affliction with a clear disregard of its limitations. He used to bound about and climb walls and do such things more than others do, out of sheer dare-devilry. The Mother had to curb this exuberance in him as he could have had an accident.

When I came to stay in Pondicherry I lived at what was known as the Pitts Guest House, a fine cottage-type place at the end of rue Dumas, No. 35, almost diagonally opposite to our present Park Guest House on the Boulevard Sud. This cottage had a nice garden in which one could sit and enjoy the evenings. Amal began to visit me regularly and we sat out in the garden and had snacks and drinks and played cards, as was the custom then. We played Bridge and Poker which is a gambling game and we had to play for stakes, small ones, to make the game more meaningful.

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Now Amal had made it a point in his life to tell The Mother of all the things he did and so he told Her of his visits to me and of our drinking and gambling. One day The Mother said: "Who is this person Pinto who tempts my children with drinks and gambling? I must catch him one day!" And, indeed, She did catch me later, not only me but also my wife and child when they later so arrived; my child being a daughter.

Amal's coming to the Ashram is quite a story. It is what I would call "The Danger of Buying Shoes". Amal at Bombay was married to a girl who was later given here the name Lalita. Before his marriage he felt he needed new shoes and so he went to a small shop in the Crawford Market of Bombay where he bought a pair of shoes. The shopkeeper put the shoes in a box and wrapped the box in an old newspaper sheet. When Amal reached back to his house he unwrapped the box and looked at the sheet of newspaper. In that old sheet he read an article on the Sri Aurobindo Ashram which he found to be very interesting. He looked at a map to find out where Pondicherry was as this Ashram was said to be at that place. He saw that it was quite close to Madras and he and his wife decided to visit the Ashram, Here, they were so taken up by what they saw and learned that they decided to stay on. So he and Lalita were caught even as, later, Mona, my newly wed wife and I were caught. This is why I call the story "The Danger of Buying Shoes", because it all started from that act.

Amal is a poet and a very fine poet at that, and with Sri Aurobindo Himself being such a great poet he found a very fine opportunity for his poetic inspiration to have its full scope. Amal wrote a lot of poetry and sent his work to Sri Aurobindo who liked it and commented very favourably, even at times very highly on it. There was a wide exchange of letters between Sri Aurobindo and Amal which makes fine and instructive reading. Much of this exchange has been published in the addenda of Sri Aurobindo's great epic, Savitri. Sri Aurobindo's explanations and comments on Amal's work are truly illumining. But one very long letter from Sri Aurobindo, published in Vol. 26 of His Collected Works and with the title On Himself, and covering about 20 pages, is a

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reply to Amal on certain criticisms which Amal had received from a friend of his on certain lines of Savitri, and is a wonderful example of Sri Aurobindo's noble humility and patience. The criticisms are, to my not very profound view, very poor and only on rule and technique with no sense of appreciation of the poetic content and inspiration. Yet, Sri Aurobindo has spent pages of explanation in such detail that it has become for us a very fine lesson in true poetry. The stupidity of the criticisms have resulted in a great gift to all of us. In His Savitri Sri Aurobindo has, in one line, forcefully answered such pedantic criticisms. He writes: "The Artist's joy shall laugh at reason's rules."

One trait in Amal's character which I admire a great deal is his courage. In spite of his crippling affliction he does not ever bemoan it but carries on as if it were a great opportunity for further adventure and progress. This is something many are apt to forget. When troubles and tribulations fall on us, instead of looking on them as misfortunes we should take them as challenges for our development. Amal exemplified this and continues to do so in all his life. Quite recently he had a very serious accident when his stronger leg was broken and had to be hung in complicated traction for weeks on end. He was not dismayed at all and when I went to see him at our Nursing Home, we had quite a laugh about it. Truly he is a fine example for others to follow when they are faced with so-called misfortunes. For this trait of his character and for his very inspiring poetry and for his joy in life I admire Amal and love him and I ask all to join me in greeting him on the completion of his ninetieth year with as noble cries as possible. First in Latin and German we shout;

"AVE AMAL" and "HEIL AMAL" and then in English with the famous quotation from a fellow-poet "Hail to thee, blithe Spirit."

UDAR

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