Memories of First Darshan

Tryst with the Divine Mother

'Darshan' was a word familiar in my childhood. There were the usual festivals at home which were celebrated with traditional Prasad. If it was Janmashtami, amma⁵ would prepare salt and sweet 'seedai'; Diwali meant 'okkorai' and 'marundhu' (a herbs-based sweet appropriately termed 'medicine'); Sri Rama Navami would bring 'panakam' (a drink made of jaggery and dry ginger) and buttermilk. The Karadaiyan Nonbu was special too. This was the Savitri vrata (in our Tamil Brahmin family) when women at home recalled the Savitri legend, wore auspicious threads dipped in turmeric around their neck and ate hot 'adai' (a sweet made of jaggery, rice flour and lentils) with fresh butter melting all over it saying, "I have performed this vrata with adai and non-clarified butter. May my husband never leave me." As our house had immense reverence for the short and squat "University edition" of Savitri which was often read and occasionally explained to us by father, the association kept 'Karadaiyan Nonbu' and the Sri Aurobindo Ashram at distant Pondicherry very close to the child's heart.

There was an equally joyous but untraditional celebration in our house which my friends could not comprehend. This was what I could explain only as Darshan Day. "I had today 'Kesari'," I would boast to my friend. "Why, anything special?" "Of course, it is Darshan Day." "What is Darshan Day?" "It's Darshan Day, that is all", I would say with impatience and we would then go on with our skipping or hop-scotch. When I had attended a Darshan Day in Pondicherry and returned home I could not explain much to my friends about it either. I remember telling them how we stood in a queue and a beautiful lady smiled at me when my turn came and gave me a flower. That was all. This was perhaps in 1946.

But this first day at Pondicherry has remained clear with me as a few images. One was, the Mother. She was familiar because of the photographs at home, but as we had been asked to keep strict silence, I was very anxious lest I speak something or exclaim about this or that. And it was a moment's encounter and my amma who was behind me gently pushed me onwards and herself did pranam. I turned back a wee little bit to see amma getting up and receiving a flower and a very big smile. Once again a fleeting moment and I could feel amma's hand shaking a little as she held my hand when we moved out. I believe I told amma that the Mother looked like grandmother!

Shankar Gowda Patil and father were standing a little away and we went to them. We showed our flowers. I do not remember what flower I had received but I remember amma's for Patil uncle saw it and told my father: "Psychological Perfection! So apt for your wife!" Then father explained what was meant by "psychological perfection" in Tamil to amma. It was the Champa or Pagoda flower which bloomed in abundance in our garden at Waltair. From that day onwards the flower was referred to only as "Annai Kodukkum Poo" (the flower that Mother gives) in our house. I remember amma happily saying often, "Today the tree is so full of Annai Kodukkum Poo that you cannot see the leaves."

The other image is Patil uncle giving me two lotuses and teaching me how to hold them by the stem. And Paru-bai instructing me how once I had moved near Mother in the queue, I should offer the flowers and do pranam. Very, very vague films in the back of memory. But how precious!

On two of my subsequent visits in the late 'fifties, I had the wonderful opportunity of Balcony Darshan. We all stood expectant, prayerful. By now I had begun my research work on Savitri and had drawn close to the Aurobindonian world. I was standing beside my father who assured me that the Mother would be looking directly at me. And so it had been, when she appeared, walked a little, held on to the balcony, leaned forward and gazed at us, intense yet smiling. Yes, she looked at me! I am sure this was the feeling of each one of us in the crowd, for she certainly flung on us her "vast, immortal look". One felt a deep sense of satisfaction. For me, it was beautiful and memorable for father walked with me reciting lines from 'The Symbol Dawn', his favourite routine:

Ambassadress twixt eternity and change,
The omniscient Goddess leaned across the breadths
That wrap the fated journeyings of the stars
And saw the spaces ready for her feet.

At this time in 1957, when I had begun working on Savitri for my research dissertation, he gave me a portrait of the Mother, standing with a smile, a card in her right hand held forward. He told me that the Divine Mother is always ready to give you whatever spiritual treasures you want; but you must go forward and hold out your hand for her to drop her message of grace into it. The portrait has been with me all this time, reminding me of father's words whenever I gaze at it. And so sweet Mother's message too, printed below, has been my favourite during this half a century:

A Power greater than that of Evil can alone win the victory.
It is not a crucified but a glorified body that will save the world.

This is a picture of Savitri herself! So it became easier for me to understand the descriptions of Savitri by Sri Aurobindo in the epic as I was drawn deeper into it for my research work:

The great World-Mother now in her arose:
A living choice reversed fate's cold dead turn,
Affirmed the spirit's tread on Circumstance,
Pressed back the senseless dire revolving Wheel
And stopped the mute march of Necessity.
A flaming warrior from the eternal peaks
Empowered to force the door denied and closed
Smote from Death's visage its dumb absolute
And burst the bounds of consciousness and Time.

It was in 1961 that I received the joyous news that my doctoral dissertation on Sri Aurobindo's Savitri had been passed summa cum laude by a panel of examiners from England: Professor Vivian de Sola Pinto, Prof. T. J. B. Spencer and Prof. H. O. White. This was the first time someone had taken up the epic for doctoral research and the message was immediately conveyed to Sri Nolini Kanta Gupta by my father. In the Ashram, eminent Aurobindonians like Nirodbaran, A. B. Purani, Kishor Gandhi and K. D. Sethna expressed their joy and I was told the Mother was very happy to get the news. On the suggestion of my father, I had submitted a copy of my thesis to the Mother before sending the other copies to the Registrar's Office in Andhra University on their onward journey across the seas. The Mother now gave the copy to K. D. Sethna to go through it and suggest corrections and improvements if any, and also asked the Ashram to print and publish the work. I had been a scholar of the University Grants Commission and the Commission now gave a grant for publication as well. The book was published in 1962.

A little before the book was out, the Mother was pleased to grant me an interview. I believe she said that she wanted to see the girl who was Iyengar's daughter. I went with my father. This remains the most wonderful half an hour in my life. Interestingly enough, the actual conversation in the room remains a blur. I was behind my father. He performed pranam to the Mother and I heard a very, very sweet voice, saying quietly: "Srinivaaasaaa, it is a long time since you came here." He grew emotional but controlled himself immediately and brought me to the front. "This is Prema, your child." And the sweetest of smiles, a deep, penetrating look into my eyes from the Mother. M. P. Pandit who had brought us into the room held out a plate to the Mother. She took out the symbols of Sri Aurobindo and herself and a rose and put them in my hands. I bowed to her and sat down while she spoke to father on his work and Sri Aurobindo-related articles. He spoke about his lectures on Sri Aurobindo at the Leeds University and how there was an increasing interest in Sri Aurobindo's writings in academia. There was then another beautiful smile from the Mother as she held out her hands in blessing while father and me performed pranam and withdrew. I still felt close to her as I did with my paternal grandmother. The gifts she gave were placed in my jewel box by me and there they have remained guarding me, as always.

The Balcony Darshans after this momentous audience with the Mother became even more entwined with my studies in Savitri and the marvel of the moment has been indescribable. One could notice with a pang the slight change in the human frame but the Ananda remained, giving a sense of fulfilment each time. Father has tried to describe the scene and perhaps succeeded too, to an extent:

But what's this bewildering drama of
The Divine in human mould?
To suffer our painful mutations — yet
Be gloriously divine!
The Avatar's descent is also her
Rehearsing our transcendence.
In defiance of scientific laws
A great new Force is abroad . . .
And She appears above the human sea,
The brief nectarean Dawn.
Walking with trembling steps and clutching at
The railing, — Mother of Love!⁶

The Balcony in Pondicherry still draws us. She is there! Recently a group of us, strangers all, remained standing for a while looking up at the Balcony. I could see the same anxious expectation and total faith in the other faces as it was in the earlier days. What was it but the Mother's Love that bound us together as we stood on the pavement? There was a meditative silence, undisturbed by the occasional cyclist or a speeding car. And then we turned to look and smile at each other. At last, as dear friends parting, we went our ways with a sense of fulfilment. How true it is: this faith in all of us does emblazon the Divine Mother's Living Flame.

- Prema Nandakumar