Down Memory Lane

Madhav Pandit

It was in 1949, the first year of my visit to the Sri Aurobindo Ashram. I was in the long queue for the Darshan of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother. A bright youth came out of a room and asked me whether I would be interested in having a photo of the Mother, a costly one. I nodded and took it the next day. That was the start of my association with Madhavji, born out of a spontaneous feeling of his that made him choose me, an unknown face till then for him, from the middle of the crowd, for a picture of the Mother, a picture I have always cherished. It is one of her photos taken in Japan.

The association that started then, grew into a happy lifelong brotherhood.

Of course he was my elder by a decade, but I respected him, not merely because he was my elder, but because of his qualities. He never treated me as if he was my elder or superior, and this too was one of his qualities.

Years later, in 1971 or so, while sitting on the staircase for going to the Mother, Madhavji suddenly asked me whether I was willing to be a member of the World Union Executive Committee, without much to do, but just to attend the meetings. He knew that I was preoccupied in the Auroville work. On getting my assent he asked the Mother immediately, in the next few' minutes, and I became a member of the World Union Committee with Mother's happy approval. As far as I remember, I attended only one meeting, and that was the end of it. It happened that way probably because I have been unlucky in committees.

In the early fifties my young son Nirmal, who had come with me on a visit, chose to stay on at the Ashram. Mother admitted him to the Ashram school, but the boarding houses- there were just a few then- were all full. As the period of my stay at the Ashram was coming to an end, I went to Madhavji a bit concerned about the arrangement for the child's stay. His answer was brief but reassuring, "When Mother has admitted

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the child, it is our responsibility to arrange accommodation for him. She has told me not to mind the cost." Shortly after, he sent me a word that a new house had been just taken on rent by the Mother, and the boy was to be put there. It became the Michele Boarding. He also advised me to see, before leaving for Calcutta, that the boy was feeling happy there.

In the early period of my visits to the Ashram I had translated Sri Aurobindo's booklet 'Conversations of the Dead' into Hindi. At Pondicherry, one morning, when I was passing by the office of Madhavji, I was beckoned in and asked by him whether I had received a copy of the above Hindi translation which had since come out as a booklet. I hadn't and Madhavji handed me one or two copies saying, "I thought so; here such proprieties are neglected."

Once when I was in the Darshan queue, my permission card was checked by Madhavji in a pleasant manner. On another occasion, when I was sitting unknowingly at a place which should have been left empty, he asked me to occupy another place which he pointed out courteously. Many others, including myself, have had occasions where we were treated rudely by some Ashramites and I learned to take these things lightly for the sake of my own progress.

Madhavji was a happy collaborator in the work of the Hindi journal Ma.

I was very much impressed by the benign, illumined and saintly personality of Shri T.V. Kapali Sastriar whom I saw two or three times on the Ashram roads, just casually. My respect for him grew more when I saw his writings and I had the pleasure of publishing some material from him in the Hindi journals. Madhav spoke of him as "My Guru", always reverently. Kapaliji passed away in 1953 when he was 67.

Sometimes Madhavji and I talked about the continued financial shortage at the Ashram at that time. In the context of the wrong ways by which money was attempted to be brought by someone and of the wrong sources from where it would be obtained—wrong from a certain moral angle—I mentioned the traditional view that the food purchased from such money would have harmful effect upon the eaters and the contrary

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view of such money-bringers and several others that the so-called tainted money became pure like gangajal, the water of the Ganges, when it reached the Mother's hands. Madhav would say, "My Guru had said that consequences of such money will have to be faced."

Madhav's memory was a storehouse. He knew where to put the finger and he would locate what he wanted. Many people had him as their contact man for the Mother and as a Secretary of the Ashram he had to ask Mother about so many things. He could draw upon his experiences in various Ashram matters.

I remember several significant observations of his. One of the interesting insights was that Mother had put some Force at the Ashram due to which none could keep a secret or hidden money with oneself. One day, sooner or later, it would reach Mother's ears or hands. And we would smile, with understanding.

Once Madhav introduced a friend 'N' to Madanlal and myself. We embarked upon a joint agricultural project at Ramapuram, off Cuddalore. There were differences among us and in spite of reconciliation efforts, it became difficult to continue. The matter went to Mother and she remarked against the man, even to the extent that she will "know him no more". Madhav pleaded with her and got some concession for him. The matter became worse later, and after Mother's passing we had to go to court where we succeeded. Later, one day, Madhav, of his own, said that N had become hostile to him also, and that it was a mistake on his part to soften Mother towards that man.

Madhav also gave some other instances where he was let down or attacked by friends whom he had helped earlier considerably, even by those for whom he had gone out of the way to assist. But these experiences did not deter him from his dharma of helpfulness.

I remember how witty his remarks used to be.

"There are no followers here, only leaders," he would say.

Also, "There is no brotherhood here, only Motherhood."

"In distribution Mother gives one piece of chocolate to each of her children, but to the naughtier ones she gives two," he would say on appropriate occasions.

I was impressed by the promptness of his decisions and quick

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dispossal of the matters before him. He attended to the visitors also without wastage of time.

On my request Madhavji planted a Prosperity plant near the Matrimandir Workers Camp at Auroville. He was holding weekly classes there for the study of Sri Aurobindo's Yoga. He was respected for his readings, but he had to stop when the situation at Auroville became chaotic. He felt hurt and sad. He wouldn't go there any more.

Some persons from Auroville still continued to maintain contact with him and he also recipiocated, but the old thing was gone. At that time when I was under suspicion and heavy clouds, he was asked by Roger Toll, an American resident of Auroville, about the Mother having chosen me. He had the courage to disclose that he had once asked Mother as to why Shyam Sunder was preferred over others and that she had given her reasons. She had said, "Andre is too old for Auroville; Nava cannot understand Auroville; Roger is impossible; there is a defect in Shyam Sunder, but I can take care of it."

My contact with Madhavji grew more about the mid-eighties. He came to see me when I was sick or there was something special to speak about. Once he opened his heart about the establishment and some individuals. But he did not quarrel with them.

He had made it a practice of offering a hundred rupee note to Mother when he went to see her every day. The day the visit was not possible, he would send it to her. After the passing of the Mother he would place it in the offering box at the Samadhi while going to his office. He had some financial transactions with the Trusts I was looking after and it was a pleasure for me that everything went through smoothly and cleanly.

On one 14th of June, when I was at Kodaikanal, I suddenly remembered him and felt our togetherness. After a few days I leaned that the 14th of June was his birthday. In fact it was his 65th anniversary.

He grew to be a Secretary of the Sri Aurobindo Ashram. He was also actively associated in the work of the Sri Aurobindo International Centre of Education. The World Union had him as its Chairman. An erudite scholar, he has written about a hundred books on Yoga, Tantra, Vedas, Upanishads, etc. He

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had a large number of admirers, a good number of them looking to him for guidance on inner problems and on worldly problems.

He passed away in 1993 at Madras, where he had been hospitalised, three months before would have been 75.

Kind, helpful, generous, he will be remembered by many.

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