India

One

and

Indivisible

A Compilation from the Works of

Sri Aurobindo and the Mother

India

One

and

Indivisible

© All writings of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother

are copyright of Sri Aurobindo Ashram Trust

and have been reproduced here with their kind permission.

©2021 AuroPublications, Sri Aurobindo Society, Puducherry

www.aurosociety.org

Year of Publication 2022

Compilation done by Jamshed M. Mavalwalla

The Idea of Compilation on India by Vijaybhai

Proof-reading:

Archana Udaykumar,

Neha Nandini Parrat,

Gayatri Majumdar and

Jamshed M. Mavalwalla

Cover Design:

Ramajayam Ramachandiran

Priyanka Gaigawali and

Jamshed M. Mavalwalla

E-book:

Karthigeyan S and

Uttam Mondal

Earlier e-books released on India are:

1. India and Her Mission

2. The Task of Building India Is Spiritual

3. The Splendour of Bharat’s Past Be Reborn

4. Spirit of Kshatriya with a Large Liberal Ideal

5. Become Indian and Do Not Imitate the West

6. Qualities of the Indian Mind

7. Develop Original Thinking

8. The Mantra Vande Mataram

9. The Men Who Will Lead India

Preface

In the continuing series of compilations on “India” from Sri Aurobindo and the Mother’s works, we present the tenth e-book India One and Indivisible. We hope that the readers will recognize that the subtle theme of each e-book contains one idea by which it can help India to achieve its mission.

This e-book focuses on the problem of Pakistan. In the message of 15th August 1947, Sri Aurobindo writes in relation to Pakistan that the partition of the country must go. As India missed chances after chances, the Mother’s message was that the Supreme has changed His Mind. Later She said that the Federation of countries would be the solution. One day in 1971 when the Mother was discussing about India and Pakistan with a sadhak daily, the latter showed an old quotation of Sri Aurobindo: “India, free, one and indivisible, is the divine realisation to which we move.” The Mother exclaimed “Oh, that's very good! It's the current situation.” Hence we give the title of the book India One and Indivisible.

The quotations in this compilation are from “THE COMPLETE WORKS OF SRI AUROBINDO” (CWSA); “COLLECTED WORKS OF THE MOTHER” Second edition; Shri K. D. Sethna’s book India and the World Scene; Evening Talks with Sri Aurobindo recorded by A. B. Purani FIRST EDITION and from Conversations of the Mother with a Sadhak.

In the introduction of the book, India and the World Scene, K. D. Sethna writes, “Not only were my editorials written under his [Sri Aurobindo’s] inner inspiration: they were also sent to him for approval. Only when his ‘Yes’ was wired to us did we plunge into publication.” So these Quotations can be taken as Sri Aurobindo’s opinion or his approval. In Purani s book, Sri Aurobindo while talking to sadhaks gave his opinion on many subjects.

After each quotation the following abbreviations are used representing the book from which it is taken.

CWSA: THE COMPLETE WORKS OF SRI AUROBINDO

CWM: COLLECTED WORKS OF THE MOTHER Second Edition

IWSKDS: India and the World Scene by Shri K. D. Sethna First Edition

CTMS: Conversations of the Mother with a Sadhak

ETABP: Evening Talks with Sri Aurobindo; recorded by A. B. Purani First Edition

This e-book also contains quotations from Wikipedia, the free encyclopaedia to explain what Sir Stafford Cripps Proposal was and that the genocide in Bangladesh began on 25 March 1971 by Pakistan Army much before the War which started on 3rd December. This is done to bring out the clarity of the situation prevailed that time.

While the passages from Sri Aurobindo are in the original English, most of the passages from the Mother (selections from her talks and writings) are translations from the original French. We must also bear in mind that the excerpts have been taken out of their original context and that a compilation, in its very nature, is likely to have a personal and subjective approach. A sincere attempt, however, has been made to be faithful to the vision of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother. Those who would like to go through the fuller text are advised to go through the original books.

The section headings and sub-headings have been provided by the compiler to bring clarity on the selected topic. The reader needs to remember that the original quotations were not written with the intention of the sub-heading given by the compiler and so one may find that the passage has few other aspects included in the quotation. All the words that are bold faced are done by the compiler so that the reader may not miss the important point in the passage. One more reason for highlighting is that Sri Aurobindo’s writings are integral and cover a range of ideas in one sentence.

The idea of taking up this comprehensive compilation on India was suggested to me by Vijaybhai [Sri Vijay Poddar] somewhere in 2003. The hard copy of this compilation remained with him for many years. It was in May 2022 he wrote to me – “I was looking again at your compilation on India. It is extremely comprehensive and very well done. I feel we should go ahead immediately to publish it as an e-book on our website.” With the help of few proof-readers, we are able to bring out the series of e-books.

Compiler Jamshed M. Mavalwalla

Why a Compilation on “India” from Sri Aurobindo and the Mother?

Sri Aurobindo says in one of his article says,

“I am impelled to this labour by the necessity of turning the mind of young India to our true riches, our real source of power, purification and hope for the future and of safeguarding it in the course of its search both from false lights and from the raucous challenges and confident discouragements cast at us by the frail modern spirit of denial. I write, not for the orthodox, nor for those who have discovered a new orthodoxy, Samaj or Panth, nor for the unbeliever; I write for those who acknowledge reason but do not identify reason with Western materialism; who are sceptics but not unbelievers; who, admitting the claims of modern thought, still believe in India, her mission and her gospel, her immortal life and her eternal rebirth.”  (CWSA 12: 62–63)

So this compilation contains all the labour of Sri Aurobindo, so that the youth in India may believe in the mission of India and her gospel and the hopes for the future are fulfilled.

But a question may arise why Sri Aurobindo on India? The part of the answer is in the letter Sri Aurobindo wrote to his wife.

“I know I have the strength to deliver this fallen race. It is not physical strength,—I am not going to fight with sword or gun,—but the strength of knowledge. The power of the Kshatriya is not the only one; there is also the power of the Brahmin, the power that is founded on knowledge. This feeling is not new in me, it is not of today. I was born with it, it is in my very marrow. God sent me to earth to accomplish this great mission. The seed began to sprout when I was fourteen; by the time I was eighteen the roots of the resolution had grown firm and unshakable.” August 30, 1905. (Letter written by Sri Aurobindo to his wife Mrinalini)

Besides the strength of knowledge which Sri Aurobindo had, his collaborator the Mother further adds.

“What must be done to pull the country out of its difficulty? Sri Aurobindo has foreseen all the troubles and he has given the solution. Just now we are approaching his Centenary; [1972] … this would be a wonderful occasion to spread his teaching all over the country: ... his teaching about India, how to organise India, the mission of India. ...

About all that has happened and all that is happening now, he has said clearly that to go back to it is useless. We must give the country its true position, that is, the position of relying on the Divine. Naturally, this is at the other end of what people try to believe now. But Sri Aurobindo explains it in such a way that even those who are against it can agree. You understand? He has found a way of saying it which can be understood by everybody. That’s the only solution, as far as I can see; it is the only solution. All the rest will mean complication, contradiction and fighting.

... And this is above politics, you see. ... It is to organise the country beyond politics. And it is the only way. In politics it is always fight and ugly fight—ugly. And it has become so bad. He was telling me always that things would become worse and worse, because it is the end of this age. We are entering into an age where things must be organized differently. It is a difficult time because of that.

Because we know what will come, we can help to make it come sooner and with less turmoil. There is no hope in going backwards; it would make things last endlessly. We must go forward, absolutely, and go beyond, beyond party. And nobody can explain that better than Sri Aurobindo, because he was so much, so much beyond party; he saw the advantages and disadvantages of all parties and he stated them exactly.

If you read carefully what he has written—so much—you will find the answer to all these questions. And at the same time you will know that you will have the full support of the Divine Power. The Power that was behind him is behind this transformation. It is time for transformation. We can’t cling to the past.

The best way to go beyond politics is to spread the message of Sri Aurobindo. Because he is no more a political element wanting to take power; there are only his ideas and ideals. And, of course, if people could understand and realise his programme, the country could be very strong, very strong.” (CWM 15: 405–406)

This compilation has also quotations from the Mother’s Collected Works. The Mother though born in France always felt that India was her true country, the country of her soul and spirit. She has declared herself Indian by choice and predilection.

“I want to mark this day by the expression of a long cherished wish; that of becoming an Indian citizen. From the first time I came to India—in 1914—I felt that India is my true country, the country of my soul and spirit. I had decided to realise this wish as soon as India would be free. But I had to wait still longer because of my heavy responsibilities for the Ashram here in Pondicherry. Now the time has come when I can declare myself.

But, in accordance with Sri Aurobindo’s ideal, my purpose is to show that truth lies in union rather than in division. To reject one nationality in order to obtain another is not an ideal solution. So I hope I shall be allowed to adopt a double nationality, that is to say, to remain French while I become an Indian.

I am French by birth and early education, I am Indian by choice and predilection. In my consciousness there is no antagonism between the two, on the contrary, they combine very well and complete one another. I know also that I can be of service to both equally, for my only aim in life is to give a concrete form to Sri Aurobindo’s great teaching and in his teaching he reveals that all the nations are essentially one and meant to express the Divine Unity upon earth through an organised and harmonious diversity.” 15 August 1954 (CWM 13: 43)

The reason why the Mother took birth in France is explained in this quotation.

“It is true that this body was born in Paris and that its soul has declared that it is Indian, but I belong to no nation in particular.” (CWM 13: 44)

She further adds that

“It is France that can connect Europe with India. There are great spiritual possibilities for France. She will play a big part in spite of her present bad condition. It is through France that the spiritual message will reach Europe. That is why I chose France for my birth, although I am not French.” (CWM 13: 379–380)

Sri Aurobindo and the Mother cannot be narrowly called Indian for they worked to uplift the humanity and move towards the next step in evolution so that all the problems of humanity can be solved. But their love for India was intense. The Mother says,

“Sri Aurobindo always loved deeply his Motherland. But he wished her to be great, noble, pure and worthy of her big mission in the world. He refused to let her sink to the sordid and vulgar level of blind self-interests and ignorant prejudices. This is why, in full conformity to his will, we lift high the standard of truth, progress and transformation of mankind, without caring for those who, through ignorance, stupidity, envy or bad will, seek to soil it and drag it down into the mud. We carry it very high so that all who have a soul may see it and gather round it.” (CWM 13: 123)

The quotations of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother are a few decades old, so one may wonder how it will be relevant today. When a Yogi or a realised person talks, even in worldly matters, there will be Truth in it. This Truth will help one much more than what he would do by his own thinking. Sri Aurobindo and the Mother had the highest spiritual realisations. Their vision and guidance can only lift India out of the present challenges she faces and help her achieve her mission. If one reads the mission that India has to achieve and the present day condition of our country then one will realise that Sri Aurobindo’s and the Mother’s quotations are as valid that time as today. Reading the compilations, one will feel that it is relevant in today’s condition.

One caution needs to be taken while reading Sri Aurobindo and the Mother’s quotations which is that one need not be too dogmatic about them. One really needs to live in the spirit behind these quotations.

This work is presented with a hope and an aspiration that the people of India may be inspired by the vision of India and the process of achieving India’s Mission may be hastened.

Compiler: Jamshed M. Mavalwalla

Contents

Section One—The Partition of India and Pakistan Must Go

I—The Nation Must Not Accept Partition as the Settled Fact But a Temporary Expedient

II—By Whatever Means the Division of India into India and Pakistan Must Go

III—There Should Never Have Been Partition

IV—India Accepted Partition to Avoid Communal Disturbances; Instead Such Disturbances Increased Thousandfold

Section Two: Cause of the Political Division of the Country

I—The Old Communal Division of Hindu and Muslim Have Hardened Into a Permanent Political Division

II—British Openly Adopted the Policy of Setting the Mahomedans as a Counterpoise to the Hindus

III—British Saw That in the Legislative Councils the Mahomedans Are Represented Not as Children of the Soil But as Politically Distinct and Hostile Interest to Nullify the Hindus

IV—Pakistan Was a Child of Jinnah's Brain

V—The Area Constituting Pakistan Was an Organic Member of the Geographical Body of Mother India

Section Three: In the Subtle World, the Mother Saw 27 Years Before the Freedom that India Was Free Without Pakistan

I—The Mother Saw India Will Be Free Without a Battle for the Conditions of the World Will Force Englishmen to Leave

Section Four: There Would Have Been No Pakistan If Indian Leaders Had Listened to Sri Aurobindo

I—Sri Aurobindo Sent Special Messenger to Accept Proposals of Sir Stafford Cripps

II—What Was Sir Stafford Cripps Proposal?

III—Sri Aurobindo Accepted the Cripps’ Offer So That India and Britain Could Stand United Against the Asuric Forces of Hitler and Could Use It as a Step Towards India’s Independence

IV—Sri Aurobindo's Telegram to Rajagopalachari Spoke of the Grave Danger of Rejecting Cripps' Proposal

V—Sri Aurobindo’s Message to Sir Stafford Cripps

VI—Sir Stafford Cripps’s Reply

VII—By Rejecting Cripps Proposal, We Averted the God-Given Chance and Created the Horrible Karma of the Massacres That Followed Partition

VIII—The Divine Always Informs But Men Refuse the Help

IX—Sri Aurobindo Did All to See That Cripps Proposal Is Accepted for It Is a Question of Play of Forces

Section Five: Not by Cutting a Country We Shall Bring about Its Unity and Its Greatness

I—Partition Is Proposed to Us to Prove to Ourselves the Absurdity of Our Quarrels

II—Erroneous Concession Granted to Jinnah Was a Grave Error as There Was Nationalist Solidarity of a Large Number of Muslims Who Stood Shoulder to Shoulder With the Hindus

III—The Power of Division Is Unsteady and Impermanent While Union Works for a Steady Power and a Harmonious Future

IV—President Bhutto Committing Atrocities in His Own Country Shows the Falsehood of Partition

Section Six—The Difficulties May Increase for India With Regard to the Pakistan Imbroglio

I—These Difficulties Were There in the World Nature and Had to Rise So That They Might Be Exhausted or Expelled

Section Seven—Missed Chances of India and Pakistan to Become One

I—In 1965 War, the Mother’s Message Was That India Must Fight Until India and Pakistan Have Become One Because That Is the Truth of Their Being

II—The War That Was Fought Was on Our Own Motherland, the Sacred and Imperishable

III—Fight between India and Pakistan Was Set in Motion Under the Impulsion of Truth That Wanted to Create a Great Asian Federation

IV—Without Kshatriya Strength Backing the Nation, All Political Struggle Is Unavailing

V—Indian Had Missed the Opportunity

VI—There Was a Large Part of Pakistan That Favoured Union With India

VII—The United Nations Security Council’s Anti-India Bias

(The United Nations Security Council has issued an ultimatum to India and Pakistan for a cease fire [in 1971 war])

VIII—Indian Leaders Were Afraid of World Opinion So Did Not Allow Fight Till the End

IX—There Were Truly Miraculous Instances of Indian Army Becoming Extraordinary Heroes and Taking Over Pakistan Would Have Been Easy

X—The Law of Love and Oneness Cannot be Preached Till the Time-Spirit in Man Is Ready

XI—Earlier Too There Was a Possibility of India—Pakistan Union

XII—Again in 1971, Indian Leader Puts the Decision Off and the Situation Becomes More Difficult

XIII—Indian Leaders Have Missed Chances After Chances

XIV—Mother’s Message on Bangladesh Crisis: Live According to the Truth

XV—The Delay in Fighting on India—Bangladesh Border

XVI—In Bangladesh War, India Did Not Wish to Take Over Pakistan So India Missed the Chance of Becoming One

XVII—Indira Gandhi Writes a letter to the Mother

“I have received a letter from Indira.

Section Eight: Pakistan’s Base Is Extreme Communalism and Her Policy Towards India Is Animated by a Pattern of Hostility

I—Pakistan Wants to Inconvenience India as Much as Possible and to Reduce India to a State of Helplessness

II—Pakistan Is an Islamic State With a Strong Antipathy to Hindus

III—Pakistan with Its Narrow Rigid Monomaniac Vision Cannot Be Mended But Only Ended

IV—Earlier Both America and Britain Were Misguided in Trusting Pakistan More Than India

V—If Pakistan Had Been Civilised, She Would Not Have Permitted 4,000 Hindus To Be Massacred and Many More Mutilated, Two and a Half Years After the Partition-Fever

Section Nine: Earlier Fundamental Weakness in Indian Attitude with Regards to Pakistan

I—By Not Striking Hard at Pakistan When Violence Against Hindus Took Place, We Have Not Served Our Country Well and Its High Principles

II—If Our Armies Had Marched Straight Instead of Taking Our Case to the UNO, That Would Have Been the End of the Kashmir Affair and Perhaps of Pakistan

III—A Flagrant Violation of All Pacts Is Pakistan's Behaviour Ever Since Partition

IV—Pakistan Is Likely to Yield to Nothing Except Drastic Measures

Section Ten: How Can the Problem of Pakistan Be Solved

I—The Partition of the Country Must Go By a Slackening of Tension

II—By a Progressive Understanding of the Need of Peace and Concord

III—By the Constant Necessity of Common and Concerted Action, Even of an Instrument of Union

IV—Unity May Come Under Whatever Form

V—By Whatever Means, the Division Must and Will Go

VI—The Supreme Has Changed His Mind About Pakistan

VII—Prediction That Pakistan Will Become a Part of India Again Without Being Forced

VIII—Five Different Parts of Pakistan Will Demand Separation and Will Join India to Form a Sort of Confederation

IX—A Great Federation of India, Afghanistan, Nepal, Bhutan, Tibet, Burma, Ceylon and Pakistan

X—The Vision of the Terrestrial Possibility in a Harmonious Future Will Be a Federation of All Nations

Section Eleven: Until Pakistan Problem Is Sorted Out, India Cannot Play Her Role in the World

I—If India Remains Divided, She Will Not Herself Be Sure of Her Safety

II—India Shall Take Her True Place in the World Only When She Will Become Integrally the Messenger of the Divine Life

Section Twelve: India One and Indivisible Is the Divine Realisation to Which We Move

I—India One and Indivisible Moving Towards the Divine Realization Is the Political Creed Which Is the Most Suited to India’s Temperament

II—India Is the Symbol of the New World in Formation, So India Must Be "One"

III—The Dream of a United India Can Be Materialised by Aspirantion towards Oneness and Reliance on One’s Own Manhood

IV—All People of Different Religions Uniting into One Great and Puissant Indian Nation

V—The End of a Stage of Evolution Is Marked by a Powerful Recurrence of All That Has to Go Out of the Evolution

Section Thirteen: Whenever India Recovers Other Parts of Herself, Spiritual Flag of United India Will Be Hoisted in the Ashram

I—United India Has A Special Mission to Fulfil in the World

II—In the Accomplishment of India’s Spiritual Mission, India’s Unity Will Be Accomplished

Section Fourteen: Unity of India

I—Sri Aurobindo Firmly Believes That a Great and United Future Is the Destiny of the Indian Nation

II—True National Unity Is the Unity of Self-Dedication to the Country When Greatness of Our Motherland Is of Paramount Consideration

III—Only India’s Soul Can Unify the Country

Section Fifteen: Unity Is the Very Basis of Existence

I—The Oneness Is Secretly at the Foundation of All Things

II—Unity Does Not Mean Uniformity and the Removal of All Differences

III—Unity Is the Master Principle of Which Division Is Only a Subordinate Term

IV—Diversity in Unity

V—In a Perfect Spiritual Unity, No Sort of Uniformity Would Be Necessary

VI—Unanimity Is a Condition Only Possible to a Nation Whose Heart Is Numbed and Whose Intellect Has Ceased to Be Active

VII—True Unity Is Spiritual

VIII—Unity in National Comradeship of the Children of One Mighty Mother Regardless of Their Class

IX—We Must Arrive at Conscious Unity With Our Fellow-Beings

X—Unity Is In the Spiritual Consciousness

XI—All Religions’ God-visions Could Embrace and Cast Themselves Into Each Other But Intellectual Dogma and Cult Egoism Stand In the Way

XII—Until Spiritual Revolution Occurs the Sense of the Others Cannot Be Understood

XIII—Nations Do Not Listen to Any True Spiritual Message

XIV—Governments Must Be Truthful and Sincere in Their International Dealings

XV—If Diplomacy Becomes the Instrument of the Truth, It Will Be a Big Step Towards Human Unity

XVI—The External Union of Mankind Depends on Man’s Goodwill and Sincerity

XVII—If You Want Union in the World, First Unify the Different Parts of Your Own Being

XVIII—In All Countries There Are People Who Believe That a New World Based on Truth Wants to Take Birth

Section Sixteen: The Ideal of Human Unity Is Vaguely Making Its Way

I—The Ideal of Human Unity Will Be the Determining Forces of the Future

II—The Unity of Mankind Is Part of Nature's Eventual Scheme and Must Come About

III—The Ideal of Human Unity Will Create a Firm Ground of Peace and Harmony

IV—A Psychological Force Which Tends to Break the Formula of the Nation and Aspires to Create a Single Nation of Mankind

V—There Is Divine Reality in Which Whole Humanity Is One

VI—Spiritual Religion of Humanity Is the Hope of the Future

Section Seventeen: Govern India through Union of All Political Parties

I—The Time Has Come to Govern Through Union, Mutual Understanding and Collaboration

II—Governing by Fear To Be Replaced by the Government of Love

III—Political Unity Can Be Prepared by Men of All Parts of the Country and Creating of a Single National Government

IV—One Should Wage a War of Ideas So That the Truth May Triumph, Not a War of Personalities

V—On the Quality of Ideas Depends the Quality of the Organisation

VI—There Is a Sufficient Force and Manhood in Us to Create Unity and Brotherhood to Which We Should Direct Our Whole Efforts

VII—India Has to Solve for the Human Race the Problem of Harmonising and Spiritualising Impulses towards Liberty, Equality and Fraternity

Section One—The Partition of India and Pakistan Must Go

I—The Nation Must Not Accept Partition as the Settled Fact But a Temporary Expedient

“But the old communal division into Hindu and Muslim seems to have hardened into the figure of a permanent political division of the country. It is to be hoped that the Congress and the nation will not accept the settled fact as for ever settled or as anything more than a temporary expedient. For if it lasts, India may be seriously weakened, even crippled: civil strife may remain always possible, possible even a new invasion and foreign conquest. The partition of the country must go …” (CWSA 36: 475–476)

II—By Whatever Means the Division of India into India and Pakistan Must Go

“But by whatever means, the division must and will go. For without it the destiny of India might be seriously impaired and even frustrated. But that must not be.” (CWSA 36: 476)

III—There Should Never Have Been Partition

“India is also a distinct geographical unit marked by mountains and rivers at the top and by seas on two sides. This unit includes what is Pakistan today. Within it there has been throughout history a common culture which assimilated all civilisations that came inside the geographical boundaries. The Muslim invaders were the most difficult to assimilate and there seem to be some characteristics of the Muslim mind which perhaps can never be Indianised, but prior to its recent confusions and clamours a potent harmonising was achieved of the finest and most important strains in it with the symphony of a thousand moods that is the Indian spirit. Moreover, even the difficult Muslim mind recognised, till lately, the geographical individuality of India and never dreamt of cutting up the country into two parcels. Owing to insufficient development of the political consciousness India was never a genuine political unity, except to some extent when under the stress of a common danger there was an attempt to bring all kingdoms under one presiding rajah or badshah. Now that the political consciousness has fully developed, there should have been a federal union of the various provinces as a political counterpart of the many-sided common cultural spirit; there should never have been partition.” (IWSKDS: 104–105)

IV—India Accepted Partition to Avoid Communal Disturbances; Instead Such Disturbances Increased Thousandfold

“India accepted partition in order to avoid communal disturbances. Instead of such disturbances diminishing they rose a thousandfold. But we still honoured the Treaty, thinking that these were unavoidable birth-pangs.” (IWSKDS: 140)

Section Two: Cause of the Political Division of the Country

I—The Old Communal Division of Hindu and Muslim Have Hardened Into a Permanent Political Division

“India is free but she has not achieved unity, only a fissured and broken freedom. … But the old communal division into Hindu and Muslim seems to have hardened into the figure of a permanent political division of the country.”  (CWSA 36: 475)

II—British Openly Adopted the Policy of Setting the Mahomedans as a Counterpoise to the Hindus

“But Anglo-Indian statesmanship will not rest satisfied with reducing the ineffective voice with which they desire to delude our aspirations, to the character of a flat and foolish echo; they will farther make every arrangement to turn it into a source of fresh weakness to the growing nationality instead of a source of strength. They [Anglo-Indian statesmanship] began of course, long ago, the attempt to make capital of the religious diversities of Indian society and recently the policy of setting the Mahomedans as a counterpoise to the Hindus has been openly adopted.” (CWSA 7: 778)

“The English have a long experience in the art of political agitation and it could not take them long to discover where the strength of the agitation lay. But they were for a long time at a loss how to deal with it without losing their prestige and reputation as a strong and benign Government. … Next they tried the effect of a general attitude of ‘sympathy’ and calm toleration covering with its specious and ample cloak a great deal of petty local persecution and secret undermining of Swadeshism. Meanwhile they were preparing the ground for an anti-Hindu campaign through the instrumentality of the Mahomedans which was only to be brought into use if the policy of ‘sympathy’ failed. The policy of sympathy did fail and the local authorities were allowed to let loose the Mahomedan mob on the Hindus. Here again there was a failure or a very partial success. The first attempt at Comilla miscarried owing to the high spirit and good organisation of Comilla Swadeshism. The second blow at Jamalpur fell with tremendous effect, but the additional outbreak on the 27th upset the official apple-cart. It went much farther, probably, than was originally intended; for, possibly, the original intention was simply to teach the Swadeshi Hindus a lesson and perhaps to give an excuse for exceptional measures. But the second outbreak went too far. It drove the Hindus out of Jamalpur, it identified the officials publicly and unmistakably with the hooligans, it lit a fire that spread all over Bengal and created a commotion throughout India; it gave a stupendous impulse to the self-defence movement all over the province; it found a few scattered akharas and left the whole Hindu population feverishly drilling and standing on guard.” (CWSA 6: 429–430)

III—British Saw That in the Legislative Councils the Mahomedans Are Represented Not as Children of the Soil But as Politically Distinct and Hostile Interest to Nullify the Hindus

“In the new Legislative Councils the Mahomedans are to have representation not as children of the soil, an integral portion of one Indian people, but as a politically distinct and hostile interest which will, it is hoped, outweigh or at least nullify the Hindus.” (CWSA 7: 778)

IV—Pakistan Was a Child of Jinnah's Brain

“Pakistan, no doubt, was a child of Mr. Jinnah's brain, but every child has a mother as well as a father. The two-nations theory on which Mr. Jinnah sought to build Pakistan was assiduously encouraged by the British Government, first as a means of dividing and thereby weakening the country it desired to keep within its power, but afterwards as an instrument by which it could secure in South Asia a bastion against Soviet expansion. While Congress was foolishly sitting on the fence between Russia and the western democracies, even casting sympathetic glances towards the former, the Muslim League under Mr. Jinnah's leadership cleverly produced the impression of being distinctly anti-Soviet on grounds of religion and also of gratitude to the British for open or secret support against Congress. The partition of India, therefore, seemed to assure Britain of an excellent military base from which Russia's aggressive designs in the Asian continent could be counteracted.” (IWSKDS: 109)

V—The Area Constituting Pakistan Was an Organic Member of the Geographical Body of Mother India

“Instead of being ashamed we take pride and think we are being democratic and doing what must commend itself in the eyes of the world. Our whole outlook has become unbalanced. No true democrat ever dreams of sacrificing nationhood or of weakening his country both economically and militarily by throwing away chunks of it. The area constituting Pakistan was not a foreign country unjustly annexed: it was an organic member of the geographical body of Mother India.” (IWSKDS: 105)

Section Three: In the Subtle World, the Mother Saw 27 Years Before the Freedom that India Was Free Without Pakistan

I—The Mother Saw India Will Be Free Without a Battle for the Conditions of the World Will Force Englishmen to Leave

“… It was some time in the year 1920). One day—every day I used to meditate with Sri Aurobindo: he used to sit on one side of a table and I on the other, on the veranda—and one day in this way, in meditation, I entered (how to put it?...), I went up very high, entered very deep or came out of myself (well, whatever one may say does not express what happened, these are merely ways of speaking), I reached a place or a state of consciousness from which I told Sri Aurobindo just casually and quite simply: ‘India is free.’ It was in 1920. Then he put to me a question: ‘How?’ And I answered him: ‘Without any fight, without a battle, without a revolution. The English themselves will leave, for the condition of the world will be such that they won’t be able to do anything else except go away.’

It was done. I spoke in the future when he asked me the question, but there where I had seen, I said, India is free, it was a fact. Now, India was not free at that time: it was 1920. Yet it was there, it had been done. And it happened in 1947. That is to say, from the external physical point of view I saw it twenty-seven years in advance. But it had been done.

Could you see Pakistan?

No, for the freedom could have come about without Pakistan. Indeed, if they had listened to Sri Aurobindo there would have been no Pakistan.

Well, externally it seems to take time, but in fact it is like that.” (CWM 5: 188)

Section Four: There Would Have Been No Pakistan If Indian Leaders Had Listened to Sri Aurobindo

I—Sri Aurobindo Sent Special Messenger to Accept Proposals of Sir Stafford Cripps

“In March 1942, at the time of the proposals offered by the British through Sir Stafford Cripps, not yet granting independence to India but leading towards it, Sri Aurobindo took the trouble of sending a special messenger to Delhi to convince certain responsible persons that the proposals must be accepted. They did not understand. Had the proposals been accepted, the partition of India and its accompanying atrocities would most probably have been avoided.” (CWM 8: 32)

“Mother, I was asking... (laughter) You said that India was free in 1915, but was she free as she is free now? Because India is not free as one whole. She is broken up.

Oh! Oh! that’s what you wanted to know.

That... the details were not there. No, there must have been a possibility of its being otherwise, for, when Sri Aurobindo told them to do a certain thing, sent them his message, he knew very well that it was possible to avoid what happened later. If they had listened to him at that time, there would have been no division. Consequently, the division was not decreed, it was a human deformation. It is beyond question a human deformation.” (CWM 8: 31-32)

“… when Cripps came to make his proposal, when Sri Aurobindo sent a message saying, ‘Accept, whatever the conditions, otherwise it will be worse later on.’ That's what Sri Aurobindo told them. Gandhi was there and he retorted, ‘’Why is that man meddling? He should be concerned only with spiritual life.’

…

… They have acted perfectly stupidly all along. Out of ambition, vanity, all sorts of things, but especially out of stupidity and total lack of understanding—a blind vision, reaching no farther than their noses.” (CTMS: November 17, 1962)

II—What Was Sir Stafford Cripps Proposal?

(From Wikipedia, the free encyclopaedia)

“The Cripps Mission was a failed attempt in late March 1942 by British Government to secure full Indian cooperation and support for their efforts in World War II. The mission was headed by a senior minister Stafford Cripps. …

Cripps was sent to negotiate an agreement with the nationalist Congress leaders (including Gandhi), and Muhammad Ali Jinnah and the Muslim League, who claimed to represent the minority Muslim population. Cripps worked to keep India loyal to the British war effort in exchange for a promise of elections and full self-government (Dominion status) once the war was over. Cripps discussed the proposals, which he had drafted himself with the Indian leaders, and published them. The Congress rejected his proposals, and they knew that the British were negotiating from a weaker position. In August 1942, the Congress working committee, taking advantage of the government's weakness, made a call that if the 'Quit India' call wasn't conceded, the Congress would resort to civil disobedience and call the people to resist and violate government authority, in the reaction British imprisoned practically the entire Congress leadership for the duration of the war. Jinnah and the Muslims, to whom Cripps had offered the right to opt out of a future Union, supported the war effort and gained in status in British eyes.” (From Wikipedia, the free encyclopaedia)

(From Wikipedia, the free encyclopaedia)

Upon his arrival in India, Cripps held talks with Indian leaders. Cripps attempted to satisfy all communities through his proposals. He was a friend of Nehru and did his utmost to arrange an agreement. However, the distrust was too high and many people of influence did not want a settlement to be reached. … He began by offering India full dominion status at the end of the war, with the chance to secede from the Commonwealth and go for total independence. … However, in public, he failed to present any concrete proposals for greater self-government in the short term, other than a vague commitment to increase the number of Indian members of the Viceroy's Executive Council. Cripps spent much of his time in encouraging Congress leaders and Jinnah to come to a common, public arrangement in support of the war and government. There was little trust between the British and Congress by this stage, and both sides felt that the other was concealing its true plans. The Congress stopped talks with Cripps and, guided by Gandhi, the national leadership demanded immediate self-government in return for war support. Gandhi said that Cripps' offer of Dominion Status after the war was a ‘post-dated cheque drawn on a failing bank’.

Muslim League reception.

Jinnah argued that the proposals were merely a draft declaration and did not meet the demands and preferred a scheme of United India. At a press conference on April he argued that there was no clear concession for Pakistan in the proposals and he further expressed concern that the Muslim right to self-determination had been ignored. He also expressed criticism for the exclusion of the Muslim League from the later stage of negotiations. (From Wikipedia, the free encyclopaedia)

III—Sri Aurobindo Accepted the Cripps’ Offer So That India and Britain Could Stand United Against the Asuric Forces of Hitler and Could Use It as a Step Towards India’s Independence

“In his retirement Sri Aurobindo kept a close watch on all that was happening in the world and in India and actively intervened whenever necessary, but solely with a spiritual force and silent spiritual action; for it is part of the experience of those who have advanced far in Yoga that besides the ordinary forces and activities of the mind and life and body in Matter, there are other forces and powers  that can act and do act from behind and from above; there is also a spiritual dynamic power which can be possessed by all those who are advanced in the spiritual consciousness, though all do not care to possess or, possessing, to use it, and this power is greater than any other and more effective. It was this force which, as soon as he had attained to it, he used, at first only in a limited field of personal work, but afterwards in a constant action upon the world forces. … Twice, however, he found it advisable to take in addition other action of a public kind. The first was in relation to the Second World War. … he saw that behind Hitler and Nazism were dark Asuric forces and that their success would mean the enslavement of mankind to the tyranny of evil, and a set-back to the course of evolution and especially to the spiritual evolution of mankind: it would lead also to the enslavement not only of Europe but of Asia, and in it of India, an enslavement far more terrible than any this country had ever endured, and the undoing of all the work that had been done for her liberation. It was this reason also that induced him to support publicly the Cripps’s offer and to press the Congress leaders to accept it. … He supported the Cripps’ offer because by its acceptance India and Britain could stand united against the Asuric forces and the solution of Cripps could be used as a step towards independence.’ [In this article Sri Aurobindo refers to himself in the third person.] (CWSA 36: 65–66)

IV—Sri Aurobindo's Telegram to Rajagopalachari Spoke of the Grave Danger of Rejecting Cripps' Proposal

“In April 1942, when England was struggling against the Nazis and Japan, which was threatening to invade Burma and India, Churchill sent an emissary, Sir Stafford Cripps, to New Delhi with a very generous proposal which he hoped would rally India's goodwill and cooperation in the fight against the worldwide threat. In this proposal, Great Britain offered India Dominion status, as a first step towards an independent government. Sri Aurobindo at once came out of retirement to wire his adhesion to Cripps; he wired all of India's leaders, and even sent a personal messenger to Gandhi and the Indian Congress to convince them to accept this unhoped for proposal without delay. One of Sri Aurobindo's telegrams to Rajagopalachari (the future President of India) spoke of the grave danger, which no one seemed to see, of rejecting Cripps' proposal: “... Some immediate solution urgent face grave peril. Appeal to you to save India formidable danger new foreign domination when old on way to self-elimination.’ No one understood: ‘Why is he meddling?’ Had it accepted Dominion status, India would have avoided the partition of the country in two, the artificial creation of Pakistan, as well as the three wars that were to follow … and the blood bath that ravaged Bengal and the Punjab in 1947 at the time of the partition.” (CTMS: November 17, 1962)

V—Sri Aurobindo’s Message to Sir Stafford Cripps

“As for Cripps’ offer, it was supported in a long telegram sent not to the Viceroy’s secretary but to Cripps himself after his broadcast in which he announced the offer.” (CWSA 36: 104)

“Sir Stafford Cripps

New Delhi

I have heard your broadcast. As one who has been a nationalist leader and worker for India’s independence, though now my activity is no longer in the political but in the spiritual field, I wish to express my appreciation of all you have done to bring about this offer. I welcome it as an opportunity given to India to determine for herself and organise in all liberty of choice her freedom and unity, and take an effective place among the world’s free nations. I hope that it will be accepted and the right use made of it putting aside all discords and divisions. I hope too that friendly relations between Britain and India replacing the past struggles will be a step towards a greater world union in which as a free nation her spiritual force will contribute to build for mankind a better and happier life. In this light I offer my public adhesion in case it can be of any help in your work.

Sri Aurobindo

The Asram

Pondicherry

31 March 1942” (CWSA 36: 469)

VI—Sir Stafford Cripps’s Reply

“Sir Stafford Cripps’s telegram in reply, dated 1 April 1942:

I AMMOST TOUCHED AND GRATIFIED BY YOUR KIND MESSAGE ALLOWINGME TO INFORM INDIA THAT YOU WHO OCCUPY UNIQUE POSITION IN IMAGINATION OF INDIAN YOUTH ARE CONVINCED THAT DECLARATION OF HIS MAJESTY’S GOVERNMENT SUBSTANTIALLY CONFERS THAT FREEDOM FOR WHICH INDIAN NATIONALISM HAS SO LONG STRUGGLED.

STAFFORD CRIPPS” (CWSA 36: 469)

VII—By Rejecting Cripps Proposal, We Averted the God-Given Chance and Created the Horrible Karma of the Massacres That Followed Partition

“That was when we rejected the Cripps proposals which seemed to come on the urge of a great inspiration and sudden change of heart. No doubt, they were imperfect, but we could have accepted their major substance and tried to shipshape whatever was rough in them. No doubt also, a turn towards conservatism took place again in the Churchill cabinet and considerably hampered Sir Stafford Cripps's movements. But our own peevishness and distrust were mainly to blame for the breakdown of the negotiations. The Muslim League in those days had not acquired the bluster of a year or two later and Congress's giving a ‘Yea’ to Sir Stafford would have meant the establishment of his proposals. India would have had substantial swaraj without the flaw of partition which rendered the freedom won in 1947 so bitter-sweet. A close co-operation between all sections of India's peoples in an all-out endeavour to fight the Japanese who were knocking at our gates would have kindled a singleness of spirit that might have led to a united India for all time. We averted our faces from the God-given chance and created the horrible karma of the massacres that followed partition: even now we have not outlived the fruits of the unfortunate sowing. It is only by the grace of Providence that India is not a complete shambles of communal fury and also that in spite of our failing to show a united front to the Fascists of Japan they could not cross our borders to spread their odious slavery of mind and life under the guise of ‘co-operative prosperity’.” (IWSKDS: 188)

“During World War II he [Sri Aurobindo] published a message to Cripps and urged India to accept Cripps's Proposals as a working basis for at the same time a united fight against Fascism and our own united freedom from British rule. On a back-look, it appears that if Congress had accepted Cripps a new mind would have been created in this country and the post-war partition and its consequent horrors would have been avoided. Indeed, Sri Aurobindo had declared that terrible things would happen if we let surface considerations side-track us from seeing the need of the moment and the fruitful potentialities of what Cripps had proposed. Later, when India became independent, Sri Aurobindo had a fairly long message broadcast, in which he reviewed the whole situation, national and international, at that time and made a pronouncement about partition which is still worth remembering: "The partition of the country must go, …” (IWSKDS: 280)

VIII—The Divine Always Informs But Men Refuse the Help

“Sweet Mother,

Why did Sri Aurobindo advise India’s leaders to accept the Cripps Proposal in 1942, when He knew fully well that they would not?

The Divine often advises or tries to guide man, knowing very well that His help will be refused. Why then does He do it?

The Divine always informs, but it is rare indeed for men to listen to Him. Either they do not hear Him or do not believe Him.  Men always complain of not being helped, but the truth is that they refuse the help which is always with them.” (CWM 16: 318)

IX—Sri Aurobindo Did All to See That Cripps Proposal Is Accepted for It Is a Question of Play of Forces

“Disciple: There are some people who even try to maintain that you knew fully well that your message to the Congress [about accepting Cripps Proposal] would fail and yet you sent it.

Sri Aurobindo: Yes, I knew that there was very little chance of its success.

Disciple: But suppose you had known that it would certainly fail—then in that case you might have spared the trouble of going and coming to Duraiswamy.

Sri Aurobindo: No, even if I had known for a certainty that it would fail still it had to be done. It is a question of play of forces and the important thing is that the other force should not be there.

We cannot explain these things to people—this play of forces—who ask for rational explanation, because it is so ‘irrational’!”  (ETABP: 791–792)

Section Five: Not by Cutting a Country We Shall Bring about Its Unity and Its Greatness

I—Partition Is Proposed to Us to Prove to Ourselves the Absurdity of Our Quarrels

(On 2 June 1947 Lord Louis Mountbatten, the Viceroy of India, delivered a radio speech proposing the partition of Pakistan from India, and of certain other parts of India into Hindu and Muslim states. After hearing the broadcast, Mother issued the following statement.)

A proposal has been made for the solution of our difficulties in organising Indian independence and it is being accepted with whatever bitterness of regret and searchings of the heart by Indian leaders.

But do you know why this proposal has been made to us? It is to prove to us the absurdity of our quarrels.

And do you know why we have to accept these proposals? It is to prove to ourselves the absurdity of our quarrels.

Clearly, this is not a solution; it is a test, an ordeal which, if we live it out in all sincerity, will prove to us that it is not by cutting a country into small bits that we shall bring about its unity and its greatness; it is not by opposing interests against each other that we can win for it prosperity; it is not by setting one dogma against another that we can serve the spirit of Truth. In spite of all, India has a single soul and while we have to wait till we can speak of an India one and indivisible, our cry must be:

Let the soul of India live forever!” (CWM 13: 351)

II—Erroneous Concession Granted to Jinnah Was a Grave Error as There Was Nationalist Solidarity of a Large Number of Muslims Who Stood Shoulder to Shoulder With the Hindus

“The partition, though accepted by Congress (as a lesser evil than the prospect of a civil war between Muslims and Hindus at the time of gaining independence), was never taken by this national body in a communal or religious sense. The refusal to take it so was not just a blinking of hard fact. It was itself based on factual considerations. Congress was never a communal or religious institution and always wanted India to be a secular State in which room could be found for all the Muslims who were nationalist in mind and did not subscribe to Mr. Jinnah's fantastic no less than fanatic two-nation theory. Even today, after partition, there are nearly forty million Muslims residing in India. If Jinnah's cry for a separate Muslim State on the ground that the Muslims of India, despite being of the same racial stock as the Hindus and having a different religion merely because of conversion from Hinduism, constitute a different nation altogether were conceded, these forty millions could have no place here. But they do have a place and many of them are opposed to the obscurantist and fissiparous tendency of the Muslim League. What the Muslim League achieved with a communal and religious policy the Indian leaders allowed on the principle that any territory or province formerly a part of British India was free to secede from the Indian Union and set up a State of its own if the majority of its inhabitants wished to do so. This principle was a grave error but it was the only thing possible in order to reconcile, with the still more erroneous concession granted to the Jinnah communalists for the sake of peace, the nationalist solidarity of quite a large number of Muslims who stood shoulder to shoulder with the Hindus. There was also the fact that the North-West Frontier Province which was hundred per cent Muslim had a strong party, led by Khan Abdul Gaffar Khan, which was all for Congress and repudiated [rejected] the Muslim League. This Province was subsequently absorbed into Pakistan by means of elections held under goonda raj, but it has never ceased to present difficulties. Then, finally, there was the fact that in Kashmir itself the popular front against the Hindu ruler was organised by a Muslim leader who openly declared his own allegiance and that of his huge Muslim following to Congress's non-communal ideals. It is, therefore, absolutely a fallacy to take for granted that all Muslims, faced with choice between India and Pakistan, would throw in their lot with the latter or would opt for the former only under duress.” (IWSKDS: 164–165)

III—The Power of Division Is Unsteady and Impermanent While Union Works for a Steady Power and a Harmonious Future

“The power of division is unsteady and impermanent.

Union works for a steady power and a harmonious future.” (CWM 15: 66)

IV—President Bhutto Committing Atrocities in His Own Country Shows the Falsehood of Partition

“… It's a scoundrel who's become the... [president of Pakistan, Bhutto].

… Quite a scoundrel. And he's killing his own people. Some teachers have been executed because they had a different opinion. He's committing atrocities in his own country.... In a way, it's what is needed to show the falsehood of the whole thing [the division of Pakistan and India].

And yet Pakistan's new president is putting up a democratic front.

By killing people!

Several provinces of West Pakistan have revolted against the people he had put in to govern them.”  (Particularly in Baluchistan at Quetta) (CTMS: December 29, 1971)

Section Six—The Difficulties May Increase for India With Regard to the Pakistan Imbroglio

I—These Difficulties Were There in the World Nature and Had to Rise So That They Might Be Exhausted or Expelled

“For myself, the dark conditions do not discourage me or convince me of the vanity of my will to ‘help the world’, for I knew they had to come; they were there in the world nature and had to rise up so that they might be exhausted or expelled so that a better world freed from them might be there. After all, something has been done in the outer field and that may help or prepare for getting something done in the inner field also. For instance, India is free and her freedom was necessary if the divine work was to be done. The difficulties that surround her now and may increase for a time, especially with regard to the Pakistan imbroglio [mess], were also things that had to come and to be cleared out. … Here too there is sure to be a full clearance, though unfortunately a considerable amount of human suffering in the process is inevitable. Afterwards the work for the Divine will become more possible and it may well be that the dream, if it is a dream, of leading the world towards the spiritual Light, may even become a reality. So I am not disposed even now in these dark conditions to consider my will to help the world as condemned to failure.” (CWSA 36: 506–507)

Section Seven—Missed Chances of India and Pakistan to Become One

I—In 1965 War, the Mother’s Message Was That India Must Fight Until India and Pakistan Have Become One Because That Is the Truth of Their Being

“The Indo-Pakistan conflict ended in a cease-fire on September 22. The Mother’s message, sent six days prior to the cease-fire was:

(The Mother’s message to the Prime Minister of India)

“It is for the sake and the triumph of Truth that India is fighting and must fight until India and Pakistan have once more become One because that is the truth of their being.” 16 September 1965 (CWM 17: 262)

“In her message, as written out for the disciple, the Mother crossed out ‘shall’ and replaced it with ‘must’; the official message reads ‘must fight’.”  (CWM 17: 262)

II—The War That Was Fought Was on Our Own Motherland, the Sacred and Imperishable

“(Regarding the Indo-Pakistani conflict:)

…

“Do you know this text from Sri Aurobindo? (Mother holds out a note)

‘... The fight in which we are engaged is not like the wars of old in which when the King or leader fell, the army fled. The King whom we follow to the war today is our own Motherland, the sacred and imperishable; the leader of our onward march is the Almighty Himself....’  May 11, 1907 (Bande Mataram)

Then I wrote this:

‘It is for the sake and the triumph of Truth that India is fighting and must fight until India and Pakistan have once more become ONE because that is the truth of their being’.”

(CTMS: September 18, 1965)

III—Fight between India and Pakistan Was Set in Motion Under the Impulsion of Truth That Wanted to Create a Great Asian Federation

“Besides, even quite outwardly, that fight between India and Pakistan  was clearly... (how can I put it?... The words that come to me are English) initiated and driven, that is to say, set in motion by and under the impulsion of the forces of Truth that wanted to create a great ‘Asian Federation’ with the power to counterbalance Red China and its movement. It was a federation that, as a matter of fact, needed the return of Pakistan and all those regions, and which includes Nepal, Tibet, also Burma, and in the south, Ceylon. A great federation with each country having its autonomous development, perfectly free, but which would be united in a common single aspiration for peace and fight against the invasion of forces of dissolution. That was very clear, it was willed—and it's the intervention of this United Nations that stopped everything.” (CTMS: September 21, 1966)

IV—Without Kshatriya Strength Backing the Nation, All Political Struggle Is Unavailing

“But every great yajna has its Rakshasas who strive to baffle the sacrifice, to bespatter it with their own dirt or by guile or violence put out the flame. Passive resistance is an attempt to meet such disturbers by peaceful and self-contained brahmatej; but even the greatest Rishis of old could not, when the Rakshasas were fierce and determined, keep up the sacrifice without calling in the bow of the Kshatriya. We should have the bow of the Kshatriya ready for use, though in the background. Politics is especially the business of the Kshatriya, and without Kshatriya strength at its back all political struggle is unavailing.” (CWSA 7: 302)

V—Indian Had Missed the Opportunity

“(Following the Security Council's ultimatum, India accepted the cease-fire as of September 22.)

“So you were right, in the end!

I was right... on what?... Ah, your message to Delhi: ‘India must fight.’

Yes.

Oh, they don't understand anything. It's a disgusting sight.

And as false as can be: they keep on fighting, only they are pretending not to.

They are all so pleased with what they've done, they are chortling with glee.

No, they're not pleased.

…

But at the U.N., they are chortling with glee, they're very proud of themselves [for the cease-fire]. But here, they aren't glad.

They are especially furious at Britain. [The British Government & press have been outrageously anti-Indian]

…

The mentality there will be hard to change. The Indians have missed the opportunity.

Yes. Ah, yes, this was the opportunity.

But it's not their fault: it's the fault of the United Nations; and the United Nations has acted from a single motive, because they were dreadfully scared of a general war—of course, this blocks the vision.” (CTMS: September 25, 1965)

VI—There Was a Large Part of Pakistan That Favoured Union With India

“This man [Ayub Khan] who is heading Pakistan doesn't represent the whole of Pakistan. There is a whole part of Pakistan that favors union with India.

Really?

A large part.

And there's nothing to say that if they feel protected, helped and supported, in fact by Russia and America, they won't push for reunion. With masses, you know, it's only a question of a current of thought: it's not reflection, not reasoning, just a current of thought.

I don't know, we shall see.” (CTMS: September 25, 1965)

VII—The United Nations Security Council’s Anti-India Bias

(The United Nations Security Council has issued an ultimatum to India and Pakistan for a cease fire [in 1971 war])

“Have you read the report of the United Nations session?

Yes, about the cease-fire?

I haven't read it: I have been told about it. But through certain things, I have been put in contact, and they seem to be a united expression of universal falsehood.

Their common ground is petty schemes and petty biases, preconceived and MICROSCOPIC ideas on the usefulness of divisions among countries so that no one country may dominate the others—nothing but absolutely superficial things, and completely false, moreover. And no sincerity, no mental honesty, no sincere goodwill—nothing. They decided in advance that Pakistan was right and India was wrong.

Unfortunately, those phantoms seem to strike terror into the people in Delhi.

Not quite. I have direct news from Delhi (Mother holds out a telegram): ‘I am deeply grateful says Shastri.’ That was following my message. [India must fight]

And in a Parliament session (I don't know if it was a Parliament session or a cabinet meeting), they were told that the true goal of India is to re-create the country's unity, and that the second goal is to give Tibet autonomy and independence. And that these are the two things India wants. And that, somehow or other, they will have to be.

Now, what are they going to do? I don't know.

That doesn't go very well with their ‘cease-fire’—they accept the cease-fire.

On condition that… there is a condition. They accept on condition that Pakistan makes very serious pledges—which Pakistan refuses to make.

Yes, luckily!

Pledges of concord, of unity.

In any event, the voice [Mother's message] has been heard—heard and accepted in Delhi. Now, of course, there is the question of strength: will they be strong enough to… But the point is established.” (CTMS: September 22, 1965)

VIII—Indian Leaders Were Afraid of World Opinion So Did Not Allow Fight Till the End

“And here is another text of mine that someone has brought back to life:

‘The world situation is critical today. India's fate too is hanging in the balance. There was a time when India was absolutely secure, there was no danger whatever of her being a victim to Asuric aggression. But things have changed. People and forces in India have acted in such a way as to invite Asuric influences upon her; these have worked insidiously and undermined the security that was there....’

May 25, 1941 (CWM 13: 120–121)

It dates back to long ago. I was here.

…

But when the division between India and Pakistan took place, Sri Aurobindo wrote very strongly: this division MUST go somehow or other, ‘by whatever means,’ he said.  And to me he said, ‘If they can't agree on doing it, they will fight.’

And yet, if we give credence to official declarations from Delhi, they don't at all intend to go right to the end. They only intend to ‘adjust’ the border a little.

There was a letter from S.M. this morning, saying that the question would never be resolved unless they…  (gesture sweeping Pakistan away).

Yes, but that's not what the Prime Minister says.

The Prime Minister… They are all afraid. Afraid of world opinion. [Four days later Lal Bhadhur Shastri announces cease-fire]

Yes, exactly

At any rate, P. is leaving today for Delhi, and he is taking with him all my ’literature’ (they had asked, ‘What does Mother say?’).” (CTMS: September 18, 1965)

IX—There Were Truly Miraculous Instances of Indian Army Becoming Extraordinary Heroes and Taking Over Pakistan Would Have Been Easy

“(Mother hands Satprem a brochure, ’Spiritual Unity of India,’ in which quotations from Sri Aurobindo and Mother on the partition of India have been gathered, in particular Mother's declaration: ‘India must fight until India and Pakistan have once more become ONE.’)

It has gone around India.

Thousands of copies have been distributed in India. There are even lots of newspapers that have written about it. It has made a lot of noise in the country.

But they don't seem—the leaders at least—to have understood at all.

The Prime Minister has fully approved. But he is a weak man. They are afraid of the United Nations.

Oh, they're afraid of everything.

But to the United Nations I have sent a lot of messages: lots of people there have talked about it. They are quarrelling. There at the United Nations, it has kicked up a din. Only, the Americans are quite unrivaled in their stupidity! All the more so as they are puffed up with conceit—they are convinced that they are the leading nation of the world, so that puts the final touch to stupidity. But anyway, they are not alone at the United Nations and it has made a lot of noise, it has shaken people up a bit.

But unless outward circumstances COMPEL India to reunite with Pakistan, they won't budge.

But it's being prepared. It's being prepared. It's going to break out all at once.

The impression is that if India isn't pushed from the outside, isn't forced to re-create this unity, they won't budge.

The army is completely with us. Besides, it seems (I have been receiving a great many letters, I've again received some these last few days), it seems they had truly miraculous instances of forces intervening, of people suddenly turning into extraordinary heroes.... There were marvelous things.

If, at that point, (Before India accepted the cease-fire of September 22) they hadn't stopped, it would have been easy).

Oh, absolutely! It's really sad.

That's just what those fools were fearing!

It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter, mon petit, because we always see just one side of things; even being in contact up above, one doesn't have the vision of the whole every minute. So, as for me, whatever happens I say, ‘It's all right—He knows better than I do.’

He knows better than I do.

No, it's necessarily the best… in the given conditions—the earth isn't in a marvelous condition, far from it—but in the given conditions, it's the best. It prepares something far more complete, far deeper, far more integral than all that we can imagine. This is indisputable, there's no discussing it.” (CTMS: September 25, 1965)

X—The Law of Love and Oneness Cannot be Preached Till the Time-Spirit in Man Is Ready

“Sweet Mother,

Sri Aurobindo writes in his Essays on the Gita: ‘The law of Vishnu cannot prevail till the debt to Rudra is paid.’ What does this mean?

Mother, is the present situation in India [On September 1, Pakistan invaded India’s border at Jammu-Kashmir.] like the debt which must be paid to Rudra?

Here is the whole quotation which I had prepared in advance for those who want to know the reason for the present situation. I am sending it to you so that your question becomes unnecessary.

“No real peace can be till the heart of man deserves peace; the law of Vishnu cannot prevail till the debt to Rudra is paid. To turn aside then and preach to a still unevolved mankind the law of love and oneness? Teachers of the law of love and oneness there must be, for by that way must come the ultimate salvation. But not till the Time-Spirit in man is ready, can the inner and ultimate prevail over the outer and immediate reality. Christ and Buddha have come and gone, but it is Rudra who still holds the world in the hollow of his hand. And meanwhile the fierce forward labour of mankind tormented and oppressed by the powers that are profiteers of egoistic force and their servants cries for the sword of the Hero of the struggle and the word of its prophet.” [Sri Aurobindo, Essays on the Gita (CWSA 19: 386)] (CWM 16: 325–326)

XI—Earlier Too There Was a Possibility of India—Pakistan Union

"But everything Sri Aurobindo said has always come true. You know he also said (but it was in jest, he didn't write it)... concerning reuniting with Pakistan he told me: ‘Ten years. It will take ten years.’ The ten years passed and nothing happened—OFFICIALLY nothing happened. But the truth is (I learned it through certain government officials), Pakistan did make some overtures in that direction, asking for a union to be reestablished (they would have kept some sort of autonomy, but the two countries would have UNITED, it would have been a UNION), and Nehru refused.

How foolish!

So Sri Aurobindo had seen it.

He had seen it happen. After ten years, when that man who headed Pakistan died, (This may refer to the death of Liaquat Ali, and the grave economic and political difficulties resulting in the dissolution of the Pakistani Parliament in October 1958, and General Ayub Khan's seizure of power) they found themselves in grave difficulty and were unable to get organized; so they sent somebody (unofficially, of course) to ask India to reestablish union on certain bases—but they refused, the Indians refused. It was a repetition of the same stupidity as when Cripps came to make his proposal …” (CTMS: November 17, 1962)

XII—Again in 1971, Indian Leader Puts the Decision Off and the Situation Becomes More Difficult

[From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The genocide in Bangladesh began on 25 March 1971 with the launch of Operation Searchlight, as the Pakistan government dominated by West Pakistan began a military crackdown on East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) to suppress Bengali calls for self-determination. During the nine-month-long Bangladesh Liberation War, members of the Pakistan Armed Forces and supporting pro-Pakistani Islamist militias from Jamaat-e-Islami killed between 300,000 and 3,000,000 people and raped between 200,000 and 400,000 Bengali women, in a systematic campaign of genocidal rape. The Government of Bangladesh states 3,000,000 people were killed during the genocide, making it the largest genocide since the Holocaust during World War II.]

May 8, 1971

“Yes, it's official. But did you see...? I've just now seen Indira's statement in the newspapers:

‘The Prime Minister Mrs. Indira Gandhi today set to rest all speculations about an early recognition of Bangla Desh by indicating quite clearly that the government of India did not propose to do so in the near future.’ (The Hindu, May 8, 1971)

Also I was told that Russia was the one opposed to recognition because she wanted to bring about a compromise with Pakistan. That's what I was told. But since everything is lies, one just doesn't know.

Yes. In any event, no country, not one has officially recognized Bangladesh—not a single one.

So what she said was true then!

Yes, and here [in ‘The Hindu’] they say:

‘The Soviet Prime Minister, Mr. Kosygin, is reliably reported to have sent two letters to President Yahya Khan of Pakistan urging a negotiated settlement on East Bengal crisis, and to have asked Mrs. Indira Gandhi not to escalate the crisis so that the peaceful solution which both Russia and India want may be achieved.’

In other words, they're seeking a compromise, like the last time at Tashkent.

(Mother raises her arms) ... Everything has to be started all over again.

Yes, everything has to be started all over.

(silence)

But is it true, there was a rumor going around the Ashram yesterday or the day before that you had sent a new message to Indira Gandhi saying that if she did not recognize Bangladesh, there was no point in her asking your advice....

No, I didn't send the message.

But it may be that.... If U.  sees her (I didn't ask him not to say anything to her), it may be that he'll tell her.... I said it to U. just like that.

Oh, I see!

So he may have got it into his head to tell her, I don't know.

And I heard also that you said that if she didn't recognize Bangladesh, there would be even more serious consequences in the future.

Yes, I think so.

You think so, yes.

It becomes more difficult each time.

Each time they put the thing off.... Oh, if only they had done it immediately, it would have been very good. Now, it's five weeks already.... [The genocide in Bangladesh began on 25 March 1971]

Yes, five weeks.

It's already more difficult. If they put it off again, it will be even more difficult.

But anyway, I didn't send any message.

Naturally, she thinks I don't have all the facts—but of course!

She knows better than you obviously! But really if she had the slightest inner discernment, she would understand that you have a wider vision of things.

Yes, but that....

You see, there are different... (what shall I say?) they're like ’layers of conditioning’ (gesture of levels), and I always try to lead people to the highest layer so that things happen without too much difficulty; but they always insist on being on the lowest layer, the nearest one. So that causes.... That's how things get complicated. If those who are capable of pulling down from above at one stroke were there [in the government], things would go swiftly and smoothly, but it's those who have the nearest conditioning and naturally understand the nearest who are there—those people are there [in the government]. And so things have to follow a certain (meandering gesture) path, and it's endless.

Well, that means the world is not ready!

(silence)

It will take another few hundred years.” (CTMS: May 8, 1971)

XIII—Indian Leaders Have Missed Chances After Chances

”How is the situation?

Oh, horrible! A mess!

Stories to make your hair stand on end.

It's like a concentration of adverse forces wanting to create as much confusion as possible.... And what is amusing is that they're coming from all sides [asking Mother's advice] except Pakistan—

Pakistan doesn't ask anything, but otherwise.... And all that....

But I was told fantastic things, for example, that Pakistan wanted India to declare war because she would immediately call for China's help; and that Pakistan is already receiving arms from America through Turkey.... Such things....

You know that America has quietly started giving economic aid to Pakistan again.

Then....

They're doing it quietly, discreetly, but they're doing it.  Their intention is to put Pakistan back on her feet.

Why, then it's over!

Yes, everything has to be started over.

They're mad!— They're all mad, mad, mad....

(silence)

In other words, they missed the first chance; they missed the second chance; now we don't know when it will come again....

(silence)

And it seems that almost all of India is officially in favor of the recognition of Bangladesh.

Yes, almost all India.... But with her supposedly higher reasons, Indira obstinately refuses to budge.” (CTMS: May 12, 1971)

XIV—Mother’s Message on Bangladesh Crisis: Live According to the Truth

“I was asked for a message for all of India [in connection with the Bangladesh crisis]. I gave one.

(Mother hands the text)

Supreme Lord, Eternal Truth

Let us obey Thee alone

and live according to

Truth.” (CMTS: June 9, 1971)

XV—The Delay in Fighting on India—Bangladesh Border

“...They're ready to fight up there [on the borders of India and Bangladesh], and they're forever waiting to be told to fight. The armies are ready, everything is ready and they're waiting. Everything is like this (hanging gesture).

What are they waiting for?

For the government to give the order.

But the government won't budge!

Oh, yes (Mother smiles), it will. It will be forced to move. But it's resisting.

Someone came here from the government, sent by a ‘commission,’ and through him the General in command of the armies has communicated with me, and he asked for my blessings. They are all ready. They're waiting—they are told tomorrow, tomorrow, tomorrow, always tomorrow. I have news from up there.

(silence)

A few days ago, in sleep, I saw Indira Gandhi. She seemed to be here and was trying to convince us of something; what particularly struck me is that everything she was saying was on a very ordinary level, and she looked very pale.

She is easily influenced, you know. So there are... (gesture of tugging).

Indeed, she has not accepted your influence alone.

No, she's taken it and mixed it with others. That's why things go like this (gesture of jumbled confusion).” (CTMS: September 18, 1971)

XVI—In Bangladesh War, India Did Not Wish to Take Over Pakistan So India Missed the Chance of Becoming One

“(On December 2, eight months after the bloody repression in Bangladesh, India launched a general offensive against the Pakistani troops, after Pakistan attacked India.)

So they've declared war.

Yes, it's done.

It began, yes, yesterday.

The ministers in Delhi have made a brochure on Sri Aurobindo, and they asked me for a message. I sent it in English. This (Mother hands a text) is the French.

…

‘Sri Aurobindo came to announce to the world a glorious future and opened the door to its realisation.’

(silence)

Will they go to the end this time, without stopping halfway?

Don't know.... It seems serious.

We get news from the front (from a general who is at the front), but this morning, I think, the news was broadcast on the radio. They could tell you exactly.

Well, I know that. What I'm hoping is that for August 15, '72, Pakistan will disintegrate.

Oh, that would be nice!... It's quite soon.

Do you have anything?

No, Mother.... The trouble is that the people in power in India have not yet acknowledged in their consciousness that India is ONE; they have not yet acknowledged the nonexistence of Pakistan, that's the trouble.

(Mother nods,

then goes within for 20 minutes)” (CTMS: December 4, 1971)

“Unfortunately you get the impression that in the west [the western front with Pakistan, i.e., Kashmir and Rajasthan], they don't want to do anything. Indira has declared that India had absolutely no interest in the break up of Pakistan: ‘Not at all interested.’  They just want to liberate Bangladesh and that's all.

(Mother sits absorbed for a very long time)

There's nothing?

…

Oh!...

This war is.... I am busy all the time, all the time.

We get letters from the front; several generals and high-ranking officers say they feel my presence all the time. And it's true, I am busy all the time.

Did they tell you that the Americans are there with their ‘nuclear ship'?

They're not there yet, it seems. It's not quite sure—they've sent it, but it's not quite sure.

They're completely mad.

Yes, that would be a disaster.

They're mad - and stupid.

Yes. That president should be toppled.

Oh, yes! Yes.

The one they want to put in his place is a friend of India. But no one likes that... [Nixon], only a minority supports him—not everyone.

They should just ... (gesture of sweeping clean).

Can't you arrange that?

(Mother laughs a lot)

... I am constantly busy.”  (CTMS: December 15, 1971)

XVII—Indira Gandhi Writes a letter to the Mother

“I have received a letter from Indira.

Oh, really?

(Mother hands an envelope)

Revered Mother,

Through these critical months I have thought constantly of you. I can find no words with which to express my gratitude for your support. Your blessings are a great source of strength. Our difficulties are not over....

(Mother nods her head)

... The American administration is most upset that its calculations were so completely wrong, and they will use their power to try to humble us and specially to create division between Bangla Desh and ourselves.

I think our nation has taken a step towards maturity. Yet there are many who look only to today. If India is to be great we must improve the quality of the minds of our people. I know that this is your desire. In my humble way I am trying to do what I can.

With respectful regards,

Yours sincerely,

Indira Gandhi

That's good, indeed.

It's good. So I replied this:

To Indira

With blessings.

India must be proud of your leadership. Let the country take its true place in the world for showing the way towards the supreme Truth.

with love

Mother

It's good she has taken this tack.

Yes, it's good.

I didn't think she was like that.

(Mother nods her head)” (CTMS: December 29, 1971)

Section Eight: Pakistan’s Base Is Extreme Communalism and Her Policy Towards India Is Animated by a Pattern of Hostility

I—Pakistan Wants to Inconvenience India as Much as Possible and to Reduce India to a State of Helplessness

“Always we should pierce to the heart of a situation. Pakistan is based on extreme communalism: that communalism is her origin and raison d'être. All her policy towards India is animated by it and every act in general forms part of a pattern of hostility. If this hostility were not there, there would be no Pakistan. So it is no use shutting our eyes to it. We should certainly not give up the idealism with which we desire to act and we should never indulge in the communalist mentality, but we must face two facts squarely : first, Pakistan wants to squeeze out all Hindus from her territories and confiscate their possessions—second, she wants to inconvenience India as much as possible and to reduce her by one means or another to a state of helplessness. The Government has realised by now that agreements are mere scraps of paper to Pakistan, but we do not yet see that this is no temporary aberrancy but the natural and inevitable mode of action of a State founded on what Pandit Nehru has called a ‘pernicious doctrine’. We keep on hoping and hoping and our persistence in wearing pink glasses takes the edge off our minds and the strength out of our hands.

It is time we acted, however nobly, in the full consciousness of what we are up against.” (IWSKDS: 126–127)

II—Pakistan Is an Islamic State With a Strong Antipathy to Hindus

“What makes Pakistan an all the more odious interloper [hateful intruder] is her bigoted [prejudiced] persecuting sectarian mentality. She is avowedly an Islamic State with a strong antipathy to Hindus and with a record of heartless harrassment of them. Intellectually, too, she is obscurantist: the latest example of her ridiculous intolerance in matters of the mind is her strict ban on the entry into Pakistan of H.G. Wells's History of the World in any edition because it contains a chapter on Muhammed and Islam which does not toe the official line of thought in Karachi! Any territorial advancement by such a country cannot help being a move against civilised values. Hence India, in refusing to accept Pakistan's presence and the terrorist Azad Government in any part of Kashmir, is not only politically but also spiritually right.” (IWSKDS: 116)

III—Pakistan with Its Narrow Rigid Monomaniac Vision Cannot Be Mended But Only Ended

“Pakistan stands out as acting perfidiously and barbarously on set policy: her very foundations are laid in communal hatred, religious bigotry, unscrupulous mendacity, delusions of grandeur, autocratic ambition. This does not mean that all Muslims in Pakistan are fanatic or base. Several of them are men of goodwill, just as on the other hand several Hindus are communalist as well as corrupt. But India, on the whole, has her face turned towards the ideals of liberty, equality and fraternity, and a general effort is there to render them active in the wider issues of international no less than national life. The opposite holds for Pakistan: what can the scattered individuals who have a conception of honour avail against intolerant and aggressive officialdom, an established and organised machinery of falsehood, repression and genocide? The two-nation theory with its frenzy for jehad is the very essence of the force that has brought about Pakistan and is the blood and bone of the Pakistan Government. Seen in its true inmost nature, it discloses itself as a minor avatar of the Hitlerite mind. This mind, with its expanding periphery of devouring desire and its narrow rigid centre of monomaniac vision, differs toto caelo from the ordinary manifestations of greed and the idée fixe in human nature: the latter are defects that do not bring the evolutionary urge in man to a standstill but only hinder it, and they can be changed by the soul's pressure, while the former is something dense and hard and unalterable, something that cannot be mended but only ended.” (IWSKDS: 149)

IV—Earlier Both America and Britain Were Misguided in Trusting Pakistan More Than India

“Further Pakistan is often an opportunist customer and the hold she has on the West is as much owing to her willingness to go over to the Russian side if her demands are not granted as to her realisation that on the whole and in the long run Russia can never mean good to her. The Government of India is incapable of indulging in blackmail talk such as was in fashion in the officially inspired organs of the Pakistani press when Nehru was made much of by the U.S.A.—namely, that the Islamic way of life can very well be reconciled with the Soviet ideology. Both America and Britain are misguided in trusting Pakistan more than India. They are therefore also misguided in looking at the Kashmir problem with a bias towards Pakistan, and India would be wise to disabuse their minds if she wishes for a better attitude.” (IWSKDS: 163)

V—If Pakistan Had Been Civilised, She Would Not Have Permitted 4,000 Hindus To Be Massacred and Many More Mutilated, Two and a Half Years After the Partition-Fever

“CAN Pakistan be trusted? That is the question we must answer one way or the other if we are to decide our own course of action in the wake of the atrocities perpetrated on the East Bengal Hindus by the Muslim population. Our Government seems to think that Pakistan can be trusted. That is why the suggestion has been put forward that a joint statement should be issued by the Prime Ministers of the two Dominions, laying down seven points to cover the whole case: (1) Each Government is fully responsible for giving security and protection to its minorities; (2) the guilty should be punished; (3) those who have suffered must be helped in every way to secure rehabilitation and compensation; (4) there should be intensive search for looted property and those found in possession of it should be punished; (5) abducted women should be recovered; (6) forced conversions should not be recognised; (7) there should be punishment for rumour-mongers, including offensive newspapers.

The very fact that the need felt by us for Pakistan's signature to such an exhaustive guarantee of good behaviour is due to her violation of every one of the seven points in the near past is sufficiently disturbing. A Government capable of all the seven deadly sins in the inter-Dominion sphere hardly presents itself as capable of self-reformation. Our optimism about a heart of gold hiding behind a face of iron would be laughable if it were not deplorable for wanting to let the fate of 12 million men, women and children hang on the word of a ruffian administration that has not shown the slightest sign of being amenable to reason or of having a conscience. If Pakistan had been humane, she would not have allowed the trans-frontier tribes passage to invade Kashmir and make a hell of the beautiful happy valley. If she had been well-meaning, she would not have granted these merciless marauders bases in her own territory nor supplied them with arms and petrol and mechanical equipment. If she had been peace-loving, she would not have sent her own army into Kashmir in spite of being aware that Kashmir had legally acceded to India and that the long-established people's party of Sheikh Abdullah was dead set against both the Afridi invaders and the puppet gang of so-called ‘Azad’ Kashmiris. If she had been honest, she would not have hidden the fact of this illegal entry from the world and admitted it only when the U.N. Commission discovered it. If she had been straightforward, she would not have led India a dance on the Evacuee Property issue and at last closed it by removing it from governmental level. If she had been co-operative, she would not have snapped her fingers in the face of our protest about the desecration of sacred places, the abduction of women and forced conversions. If she had been helpful, she would not, with the aim of incommoding Indian trade, have refused to devalue her rupee and to supply raw materials to India at agreed predevaluation prices even though India had not refused to buy Pakistan's jute as charged. If she had been friendly, she would not have debarred the Hindu minority within her borders from holding high posts in the Government service. If she had been civilised, she would not have permitted nearly 4,000 Hindus to be massacred and many more mutilated—two and a half years after the partition-fever. If she had not been bent on exterminating the Hindus, there would have been no such incident as that at Kurmitola where the armed guards connived at wholesale butchery or that other on February 28 when the Assam Mail was attacked and looting, murder and assault continued for an hour, with the police in the train keeping aloof and only making a show of firing after the miscreants had finished and departed. If she had been capable of conscience, she would not have refused Pandit Nehru's offer of a joint-tour in the distressed areas or a joint fact-finding commission. If she could have looked the world in the face, she would not have paralysed the press and clamped down an iron curtain and recently disaccredited Mr. Wilfred Lazarus, P.T.I.'s Staff Correspondent, for publishing reports that are based on unimpeachable evidence and inquiry. Here and there a few concessions have been made to the demand for international fair play, but what is given with the right hand is soon taken away with the left, and mostly we have empty words with no deeds to confirm them.” (IWSKDS: 147–149)

Section Nine: Earlier Fundamental Weakness in Indian Attitude with Regards to Pakistan

I—By Not Striking Hard at Pakistan When Violence Against Hindus Took Place, We Have Not Served Our Country Well and Its High Principles

“But no right measures are possible unless we burn with the conviction that Pakistan is incorrigible and that every act of violence or injustice to Hindus by her nationals reflects the mind of the Government itself. This has been driven home to us again and again, and yet we go on cherishing illusions. There is also a fundamental weakness in our attitude and Pakistan is well aware of it. Suppose she had our resources and our military might. And suppose, again, there were 36 million Hindus within her borders who might serve as hostages—just as we have 36 million Muslims. Would we have dared to behave as high-handedly as she does? Would we have run the risk of drawing manifold retaliation for allowing Muslims to be robbed and tortured and killed? Something is unquestionably amiss with a frame of mind that can stand nonsense on so huge a scale.

We are at a critical moment of our history. While doing everything in our power to ensure safety to the Indian Muslims, we must strike as hard as we can at the communalist aggressiveness that is bent in Pakistan on making peace and security impossible for Hindus. There was some ray of hope in the warning by Pandit Nehru: ‘If the methods we have suggested are not agreed to, it may be that we shall have to adopt other methods.’ But has the welcome note of firmness been sustained? We have grown so accustomed to being weak and compromising that it will be a regular effort to be keyed up to the proper pitch. But the hour is ripe for grasping the nettle with virile hands. If we fail to do so, we shall ill-serve our country and its high principles.” (IWSKDS: 128–129)

II—If Our Armies Had Marched Straight Instead of Taking Our Case to the UNO, That Would Have Been the End of the Kashmir Affair and Perhaps of Pakistan

“In Kashmir we have wilful and brazen invasion of territory that has rightfully acceded to India and in which the people's party dating from far British times is, in spite of being Muslim-led, all for India. Conditions have been created to make a fair plebiscite impossible. If India had not refrained from strafing the bases given by Pakistan in her territory to the trans-frontier marauders and if we had let our armies march straight on instead of curbing them and taking our case to the U.N.O., there would have been an end of the Kashmir affair and perhaps an end even of Pakistan.” (IWSKDS: 127)

III—A Flagrant Violation of All Pacts Is Pakistan's Behaviour Ever Since Partition

“...In the matter of evacuee property her conduct has been infamous. Since the value of property left in Pakistan by Hindu refugees is four times that of property left here by Muslim refugees, Pakistan has cared not a hoot to come to any equitable arrangement, but has gone on tightening more and more her evacuee property law. As a last stroke, she has removed the whole issue from the list of subjects to be discussed on governmental level! A list of 7,250 abducted women has been sent to her Government, with definite clues to the recovery of several hundreds of them. A deaf ear has been turned to our plea. In June and July, 1948, a list of about 800 Hindu and Sikh temples reported to have been desecrated was forwarded. Since March, 1949, a further list of 96 temples and Gurdwaras, 74 of which are situated in Karachi, has been sent. The Pakistan Government has not even deigned to give a reply! In the meantime a campaign of blackwashing is going on in the Security Council. And here it may be recalled that last year Pakistan voted vehemently against India's admission to membership of this Council, while all the remaining Muslim countries of the world voted in India's favour. An ineradicable animosity towards India and a resolution not to come to terms with her on any account and a flagrant violation of all pacts have been the distinguishing marks of Pakistan's behaviour ever since Partition.

And now comes the persecution in East Bengal. And what are we going to do about it? We shall protest and we shall hold conferences with the Pakistan Ministers. Perhaps there will be quiet again. But how shall we undo the crimes committed against us and how are we to prevent their repetition in the future? Are we to learn no lesson from the fact that every proposal for a reasonable solution has been bluntly rejected? Pakistan wants no joint fact-finding commission, refuses the suggestion of a joint tour by the Prime Ministers of both countries, spurns even the appeal of the Indian Red Cross for observation by international Red Cross representatives. Instead of helping us, she allows inflammatory falsehoods to be spread by her press so that more and more the lot of her minorities may be worsened, and her Ministers keep on fire-eating, and lately the preposterous claim was made that India should be further partitioned in order to provide a separate homeland for the Indian Muslims. We must take the right measures for our safety.” (IWSKDS: 127–128)

“...the Partition Treaty… express understanding that in spite of the cleavage the minorities left in either section should be protected to the fullest. The Indian Government has carried out its promise in an exemplary fashion. Whatever riots took place against the Muslims at the beginning of our post-partition history were sought to be quelled with a firm hand. ...

Yes, India has kept her word. Pakistan has completely broken hers. The conditions that are integral to the Partition Treaty have been most flagrantly violated and there is not the least sign of any possible change of heart in the Pakistan Government.” (IWSKDS: 141)

IV—Pakistan Is Likely to Yield to Nothing Except Drastic Measures

“But three factors are in the way.

First, the comparative smallness of the Pakistani phenomenon: we are inclined to think of it in terms rather of the obnoxious bully than of the Hitlerite Giant or the Stalinist Titan. Second, the common stock from which the Muslims and the Hindus are sprung: we are disposed to feel that after all the inhabitants of Pakistan are really the same race as ourselves though converted to Islam. Third, the exaggerated humanism and pacifism that is mistaken for spirituality: we want to avoid unpleasant necessities by all sorts of moral appeals, optimistic compromises, sweet-tempered appeasements. The three factors are not always to be thrust aside. The comparative smallness should save us from a sense of desperation and from the folly of ever leaning toward Stalin in order to punish the brood of Jinnah. The common stock should make us less self-righteous and prevent us from believing that the Muslims across the border can never be reassimilated. The anti-war penchant should restrain from abuse the flush of power that goes with newly-won freedom. But we must not let our vision be clouded or our hands tied. We must realise vividly that the ideology of Pakistan's Government is such as to render those possessed by it incorrigible and that, short of internal breakdown, this Government is likely to yield to nothing except drastic measures.

Joint declarations are a farce. They can have effect only when the party we intend to reform is alive to the wrongness of its deeds. Pakistan does not even admit that atrocities on a grand scale have taken place.”  (IWSKDS: 147–150)

Section Ten: How Can the Problem of Pakistan Be Solved

I—The Partition of the Country Must Go By a Slackening of Tension

II—By a Progressive Understanding of the Need of Peace and Concord

III—By the Constant Necessity of Common and Concerted Action, Even of an Instrument of Union

IV—Unity May Come Under Whatever Form

V—By Whatever Means, the Division Must and Will Go

“The partition of the country must go,—it is to be hoped by a slackening of tension, by a progressive understanding of the need of peace and concord [harmony, friendship, accord] by the constant necessity of common and concerted action [resolute action], even of an instrument of union for that purpose. In this way unity may come about under whatever form—the exact form may have a pragmatic but not a fundamental importance. But by whatever means, the division must and will go. For without it the destiny of India might be seriously impaired and even frustrated. But that must not be.” (CWSA 36: 476)

VI—The Supreme Has Changed His Mind About Pakistan

“Note written by Mother in English (with a touch of irony so reminiscent of Sri Aurobindo).

(Concerning Pakistan)

It is quite evident that for some reason or other–or perhaps for no reason at all–the Supreme has changed His mind about it."  (CTMS: January 25, 1958)

VII—Prediction That Pakistan Will Become a Part of India Again Without Being Forced

“But one doesn't see any solution other than military. The problem must be solved, mustn't it?

There could be the solution of Pakistan becoming a part of India again.

Yes, but that's not possible unless they are swallowed up.

They may come to it without being forced.” (CTMS: September 25, 1965)

VIII—Five Different Parts of Pakistan Will Demand Separation and Will Join India to Form a Sort of Confederation

“Well, they've stopped fighting in the west....

(Mother nods her head)

Which means it's not the end of the problem.

Again it won't be for this time.

It won't be done that way. I've seen how. It won't be done through a battle: the different parts of Pakistan will demand separation. There are five of them. And by separating, they'll join India—to form a sort of confederation. That's how it will be done.

It will break up from within, yes, I see.

That's right. That's how it will be done.

I saw it, I don't remember what day (recently), all of a sudden, for several hours there was a contact with the Divine Power and Vision—it was... it was magnificent, things became extraordinary; then, immediately the next day, all the news changed. Really extraordinary. What actually took place isn't what I saw, for it was seen years ahead.... But that doesn't matter, it's all right.”  (CTMS: December 18, 1971)

IX—A Great Federation of India, Afghanistan, Nepal, Bhutan, Tibet, Burma, Ceylon and Pakistan

“(Mother said the following to Kireet Joshi: ‘India should work for a federation of Tibet with India. Sri Aurobindo had the vision of a great federation of Afghanistan, Nepal, Bhutan, Tibet, Burma, Ceylon and India—and Pakistan—so that all these countries would be united under one large federation.’)” (CTMS: January 20, 1973)

X—The Vision of the Terrestrial Possibility in a Harmonious Future Will Be a Federation of All Nations

”’All the countries live in falsehood. If only one country stood courageously for truth, the world might be saved.’

(silence)

Towards the end of the day, when I was alone, I began asking Sri Aurobindo precisely what he meant.... Naturally, his hope is that the country that ‘stood for Truth’ would be India—for the moment, she is very far from it. But... And since the subject was before me, I asked him how he saw the terrestrial possibility in a harmonious future.

Then he said to me—it was very simple, very clear: ‘A federation of all nations and countries without exception, all continents. A single federation: the federation of all human nations of the earth.’ And a group—a governing group—consisting of one representative from each country, the most able man from the standpoint of political and economic organization. And nothing of the proportional question that would give large countries many representatives and small ones only one—one representative for every country. Because every country represents one aspect of the problem. And they would sit in rotation.

It was a vast vision, not so much with words as with a vision.” (CTMS: June 7, 1967)

Section Eleven: Until Pakistan Problem Is Sorted Out, India Cannot Play Her Role in the World

”Yes, one has the feeling that this Pakistan problem is symbolic, and that until it is sorted out, India will not play her role in the world.

That's right.” (CTMS: September 29, 1965)

I—If India Remains Divided, She Will Not Herself Be Sure of Her Safety

“For in any case the unification is a necessity in the course of Nature, an inevitable movement and its achievement can be safely foretold. Its necessity for the nations also is clear, for without it the freedom of the small peoples can never be safe hereafter and even large and powerful nations cannot really be secure. India, if she remains divided, will not herself be sure of her safety. It is therefore to the interest of all that union should take place. Only human imbecility and stupid selfishness could prevent it. Against that, it has been said, even the gods strive in vain; but it cannot stand for ever against the necessity of Nature and the Divine Will.” (CWSA 36: 476–477)

II—India Shall Take Her True Place in the World Only When She Will Become Integrally the Messenger of the Divine Life

“(Mother hands Satprem a letter:)

This is what I sent to Indira. You can read it to me, I don't even remember what I put.

‘India shall take her true place in the world only when she will become integrally the messenger of the Divine Life.’

What was the occasion?

She wrote me a very nice letter to express her gratitude, and she asked if I had something to tell her, so that's what I replied.

It seems she speaks in earnest about India's spiritual mission.” (CTMS: April 26, 1972)

Section Twelve: India One and Indivisible Is the Divine Realisation to Which We Move

“I have found two quotations for the April Bulletin...

‘India, free, one and indivisible, is the divine realisation to which we move.’ April 1907 (CWSA 6: 302)

Oh, that's very good! It's the current situation.

‘The end of a stage of evolution is usually marked by a powerful recrudescence of all that has to go out of the evolution.’  1909-1910 (CWSA 13: 33)

That's just right, exactly what is needed!... They should be put in together.” (CTMS: April 7, 1971)

I—India One and Indivisible Moving Towards the Divine Realization Is the Political Creed Which Is the Most Suited to India’s Temperament

“Vedantism accepts no distinction of true or false religions, but considers only what will lead more or less surely, more or less quickly to moksha, spiritual emancipation [liberation] and the realization of the Divinity within. Our attitude is a political Vedantism. India, free, one and indivisible, is the divine realization to which we move,—emancipation our aim; to that end each nation must practise the political creed which is the most suited to its temperament and circumstances; for that is the best for it which leads most surely and completely to national liberty and national self-realization. But whatever leads only to continued subjection must be spewed out as mere vileness and impurity.” (CWSA 6: 302–303)

II—India Is the Symbol of the New World in Formation, So India Must Be "One"

“But I feel that the more India procrastinates or beats around the bush, the more difficult the situation will become for her.

Oh, but it's over, she's not procrastinating anymore.

Yes, except that she doesn't want to recognize the government of Bengal officially.

Yes, she does.

??

They have even helped to form it.

!?

That was these past few days—the news hasn't come out yet. I get news that hasn't come out.

(silence)

It's far more serious than it seems.

Yes, Mother.

(silence)

But, Mother, I have the feeling India is the symbol of the world's battle and the new Consciousness cannot be established in the world so long as India has not regained her unity.

Yes.

(silence)

It's obvious that India is the symbol of the New World in formation, so India must be ‘one’, symbolically, in order for the New World to see the light of day....

Yes.

Consequently Pakistan has to disappear.

But of course!

There's no doubt about that. So this must be the time.

But they've already missed one chance. (In 1965, with the infamous cease-fire and Tashkant surrender)

…

You see, the Force is so active.... Lies that have gone on for years are becoming visible here too—the mixture is everywhere.

Such a… such a force of truth would be needed, you know, a force that would be great enough to overcome all that.

(silence)

For me, Victory is certain, but I don't know if it's tomorrow or... (gesture into the distance).

I don't know what road we will take to get there.

Victory is certain, that's obvious, but what road are we going to take to get there?

And it very much depends on our individual position; that's what they don't understand. We must cling, cling so tightly to the Truth that nothing can touch us.

(silence)

It always comes back to the same thing: ‘What You will, Lord, what You will.’

But that has become formidable.”  (CTMS: April 7, 1971)

III—The Dream of a United India Can Be Materialised by Aspirantion towards Oneness and Reliance on One’s Own Manhood

“The unity of India has been slowly prepared by the pressure from above and the creation of a reaction from below. It is only by that reaction giving birth to a self-conscious democracy aspirant towards oneness and freedom and reliant on its own manhood, that the dream of a United India can be materialised.” (CWSA 8: 285–286)

IV—All People of Different Religions Uniting into One Great and Puissant Indian Nation

“The nation-idea in India will realise itself, in all its departments, along what may be called federal lines,—it will be a union of different nationalities, each preserving its own specific elements both of organisation and ideal, each communicating to the others what they lack in either thought or character, and all moving together towards one universal end, both in civic and social life, progressively realising that end along its own historic and traditional lines, and thus indefinitely drawing near to each other, without, for an equally indefinite period, actually losing themselves in any one particular form of that life, whether old or new. The Mahomedan, the Hindu, the Buddhist, the Christian in India will not have to cease to be Mahomedan, Hindu, Buddhist, or Christian, in any sense of the term, for uniting into one great and puissant Indian Nation. Devotion to one’s own ideals and institutions, with toleration and respect for the ideals and institutions of other sections of community, and an ardent love and affection for the common civic life and ideal of all—these are what must be cultivated by us now, for the building up of the real Indian Nation.” (CWSA 6: 169)

V—The End of a Stage of Evolution Is Marked by a Powerful Recurrence of All That Has to Go Out of the Evolution

“The end of a stage of evolution is usually marked by a powerful recrudescence of all that has to go out of the evolution. It is a principle of Nature that in order to get rid of any powerful tendency or deep-seated association in humanity, whether in the mass or in the individual, it has first to be exhausted by bhoga or enjoyment, afterwards to be dominated and weakened by nigraha or control and, finally, when it is weak, to be got rid of by samyama, rejection or self-dissociation. The difference between nigraha and samyama is that in the first process there is a violent struggle to put down, coerce and, if possible, crush the tendency, the reality of which is not questioned, but in the second process it is envisaged as a dead or dying force, its occasional return marked with disgust, then with impatience, finally with indifference as a mere ghost, vestige or faint echo of that which was once real but is now void of significance. Such a return is part of the process of Nature for getting rid of this undesirable and disappearing quantity.” (CWSA 13: 33)

Section Thirteen: Whenever India Recovers Other Parts of Herself, Spiritual Flag of United India Will Be Hoisted in the Ashram

I—United India Has A Special Mission to Fulfil in the World

“(On 1 November 1954 Pondicherry and the other French settlements in India were transferred to the Indian Union. To celebrate the occasion the flag with Mother’s symbol at its centre was hoisted at the Ashram at 6.20 a.m., when Mother read out the following message.)

For us the 1st November has a deep significance. We have a flag which Sri Aurobindo called the Spiritual Flag of United India. Its square form, its colour and every detail of its design have a symbolic meaning. It was hoisted on the 15th August 1947 when India became free. It will now be hoisted on the 1st November 1954 when these settlements get united with India and it will be hoisted in the future whenever India recovers other parts of herself. United India has a special mission to fulfil in the world. Sri Aurobindo laid down his life for it and we are prepared to do the same.” 1 November 1954 (CWM 13: 354)

II—In the Accomplishment of India’s Spiritual Mission, India’s Unity Will Be Accomplished

“(About ‘the Mother’s flag’, which contains her symbol in gold centred on a silver-blue background)

It is the flag of India’s spiritual mission. And in the accomplishment of this mission will India’s unity be accomplished.” 15 August 1947 (CWM 13: 352)

Section Fourteen: Unity of India

I—Sri Aurobindo Firmly Believes That a Great and United Future Is the Destiny of the Indian Nation

“This much however, I will say that the Light which led us to freedom, though not yet to unity, still burns and will burn on till it conquers. I believe that firmly that a great and united future is the destiny of this nation and its peoples. The Power that brought us through so much struggle and suffering to freedom, will achieve also, through whatever strife or trouble, the aim which so poignantly occupied the thoughts of the fallen leader [Gandhiji] at the time of his tragic ending; as it brought us freedom, it will bring us unity. A free and united India will be there and the Mother will gather around her her sons and weld them into a single national strength in the life of a great and united people.” (CWSA 36: 497)

II—True National Unity Is the Unity of Self-Dedication to the Country When Greatness of Our Motherland Is of Paramount Consideration

“True national unity is the unity of self-dedication to the country when the liberty and greatness of our motherland is the paramount consideration to which all others must be subordinated.” (CWSA 7: 722)

III—Only India’s Soul Can Unify the Country

“It is only India’s soul who can unify the country.

Externally the provinces of India are very different in character, tendencies, culture, as well as in language, and any attempt to unify them artificially could only have disastrous results.

But her soul is one, intense in her aspiration towards the spiritual truth, the essential unity of the creation and the divine origin of life, and by uniting with this aspiration the whole country can recover a unity that has never ceased to exist for the superior mentality.”  (CWM 13: 368)

Section Fifteen: Unity Is the Very Basis of Existence

I—The Oneness Is Secretly at the Foundation of All Things

“Unity is an idea which is not at all arbitrary or unreal; for unity is the very basis of existence. The oneness that is secretly at the foundation of all things, the evolving spirit in Nature is moved to realise consciously at the top; the evolution moves through diversity from a simple to a complex oneness. Unity the race moves towards and must one day realise.

But uniformity is not the law of life. Life exists by diversity; it insists that every group, every being shall be, even while one with all the rest in its universality, yet by some principle or ordered detail of variation unique. The over-centralisation which is the condition of a working uniformity, is not the healthy method of life.” (CWSA 25: 513)

II—Unity Does Not Mean Uniformity and the Removal of All Differences

“What is it that we mean when we talk of the necessity of unity? Unity does not mean uniformity and the removal of all differences. There are some people who talk as if unity in religion, for instance, could not be accomplished except by uniformity. But uniformity of religion is a psychical impossibility forbidden by the very nature of the human mind. So long as men differ in intellect, in temperament, in spiritual development, there must be different religions and different sects of the same religion.” (CWSA 6: 372)

“Peace through human unity:

Unity through uniformity is an absurdity.

Unity must be realised through the union of the many.

Each one is part of the unity; each one is indispensable to the whole.” (CWM 13: 202)

III—Unity Is the Master Principle of Which Division Is Only a Subordinate Term

“The atom stands apart from all others even in its union with them, rejects death and dissolution under any ordinary force and is the physical type of the separate ego defining its existence against the principle of fusion in Nature. But unity is as strong a principle in Nature as division; it is indeed the master principle of which division is only a subordinate term, and to the principle of unity every divided form must therefore subordinate itself in one fashion or another by mechanical necessity, by compulsion, by assent or inducement. Therefore, if Nature for her own ends, in order principally to have a firm basis for her combinations and a fixed seed of forms, allows the atom ordinarily to resist the process of fusion by dissolution, she compels it to subserve the process of fusion by aggregation; the atom, as it is the first aggregate, is also the first basis of aggregate unities.” (CWSA 21 - 22: 213)

IV—Diversity in Unity

“… an essential principle of Nature,—diversity in unity. Therefore it would seem that the ideal or ultimate aim of Nature must be to develop the individual and all individuals to their full capacity, to develop the community and all communities to the full expression of that many-sided existence and potentiality which their differences were created to express, and to evolve the united life of mankind to its full common capacity and satisfaction, not by suppression of the fullness of life of the individual or the smaller commonalty, but by full advantage taken of the diversity which they develop. This would seem the soundest way to increase the total riches of mankind and throw them into a fund of common possession and enjoyment.” (CWSA 25: 422)

“Owing to the defects of our mentality uniformity has to a certain extent to be admitted and sought after; still the real aim of Nature is a true unity supporting a rich diversity. Her secret is clear enough from the fact that though she moulds on one general plan, she insists always on an infinite variation. The plan of the human form is one, yet no two human beings are precisely alike in their physical characteristics. Human nature is one in its constituents and its grand lines, but no two human beings are precisely alike in their temperament, characteristics and psychological substance.” (CWSA 25: 424)

“Therefore we see that in this harmony between our unity and our diversity lies the secret of life; Nature insists equally in all her works upon unity and upon variation. We shall find that a real spiritual and psychological unity can allow a free diversity and dispense with all but the minimum of uniformity which is sufficient to embody the community of nature and of essential principle. Until we can arrive at that perfection, the method of uniformity has to be applied, but we must not over-apply it on peril of discouraging life in the very sources of its power, richness and sane natural self-unfolding.” (CWSA 25: 425)

V—In a Perfect Spiritual Unity, No Sort of Uniformity Would Be Necessary

“But freedom is as necessary to life as law and regime; diversity is as necessary as unity to our true completeness. Existence is one only in its essence and totality, in its play it is necessarily multiform. Absolute uniformity would mean the cessation of life, while on the other hand the vigour of the pulse of life may be measured by the richness of the diversities which it creates. At the same time, while diversity is essential for power and fruitfulness of life, unity is necessary for its order, arrangement and stability. Unity we must create, but not necessarily uniformity. If man could realise a perfect spiritual unity, no sort of uniformity would be necessary; for the utmost play of diversity would be securely possible on that foundation. If again he could realise a secure, clear, firmly-held unity in the principle, a rich, even an unlimited diversity in its application might be possible without any fear of disorder, confusion or strife. Because he cannot do either of these things he is tempted always to substitute uniformity for real unity. While the life-power in man demands diversity, his reason favours uniformity. It prefers it because uniformity gives him a strong and ready illusion of unity in place of the real oneness at which it is so much more difficult to arrive. It prefers it, secondly, because uniformity makes easy for him the otherwise difficult business of law, order and regimentation. It prefers it too because the impulse of the mind in man is to make every considerable diversity an excuse for strife and separation and therefore uniformity seems to him the one secure and easy way to unification.” (CWSA 25: 423–424)

VI—Unanimity Is a Condition Only Possible to a Nation Whose Heart Is Numbed and Whose Intellect Has Ceased to Be Active

“… unanimity is not unity but merely an affectation of unity. There is an idea in many minds that our salvation lies in the removal of all differences, religious, social and political, but we may wait for many millenniums before such an utopia can be reached in this world. Differences of religion, social status and political opinion there must be. Unanimity is a condition only possible to a nation whose heart is numbed and whose intellect has ceased to be active; for diversity is the very condition of activity, its cause and again its result.” (CWSA 7: 1052)

VII—True Unity Is Spiritual

“… the true unity is not merely an association and agglomeration like that of physical cells joined by a life of common interests; it is not even an emotional understanding, sympathy, solidarity or close drawing together. Only then are we really unified with those separated from us by the divisions of Nature, when we annul the division and find ourselves in that which seemed to us not ourselves. Association is a vital and physical unity … Nearness, sympathy, solidarity create a mental, moral and emotional unity; ... But the true unity is spiritual; ...” (CWSA 23: 108)

VIII—Unity in National Comradeship of the Children of One Mighty Mother Regardless of Their Class

“There is yet another unity which is as yet only dimly symbolised in the ceremony of the Rakhi, a unity which cannot come into being until a perfect comradeship in aspiration, in struggle, in suffering shall have been created throughout the length and breadth of the land,—the unity in national comradeship of the children of one mighty Mother, whatever their class or condition,—Indian fraternity based on Indian liberty and Indian equality.” (CWSA 8: 286)

IX—We Must Arrive at Conscious Unity With Our Fellow-Beings

“… man is separated in his mind, his life, his body from the universal and therefore, even as he does not know himself, is equally and even more incapable of knowing his fellow-creatures. He forms by inferences, theories, observations and a certain imperfect capacity of sympathy a rough mental construction about them; but this is not knowledge. Knowledge can only come by conscious identity, for that is the only true knowledge,—existence aware of itself. We know what we are so far as we are consciously aware of ourself, the rest is hidden; so also we can come really to know that with which we become one in our consciousness, but only so far as we can become one with it. … Therefore we must arrive at a conscious unity with our fellow-beings and not merely at the sympathy created by love or the understanding created by mental knowledge, which will always be the knowledge of their superficial existence and therefore imperfect in itself and subject to denial and frustration by the uprush of the unknown and unmastered from the subconscient or the subliminal in them and us. But this conscious oneness can only be established by entering into that in which we are one with them, the universal; and the fullness of the universal exists consciently only in that which is superconscient to us, in the Supermind: for here in our normal being the greater part of it is subconscient and therefore in this normal poise of mind, life and body it cannot be possessed.” (CWSA 21: 226–227)

“Equally, man, as he develops, becomes acutely aware of the discord and ignorance that governs his relations with the world, acutely intolerant of it, more and more set upon finding a principle of harmony, peace, joy and unity. This too can only come to him from above. For only by developing a mind which shall have knowledge of the mind of others as of itself, free from our mutual ignorance and misunderstanding, a will that feels and makes itself one with the will of others, an emotional heart that contains the emotions of others as its own, a life-force that senses the energies of others and accepts them for its own and seeks to fulfil them as its own, and a body that is not a wall of imprisonment and defence against the world, but all this under the law of a Light and Truth that shall transcend the aberrations and errors, the much sin and falsehood of our and others' minds, wills, emotions, life-energies,—only so can the life of man spiritually and practically become one with that of his fellow-beings and the individual recover his own universal self.” (CWSA 21: 230)

“So far as we really succeed in living for others, it is done by an inner spiritual force of love and sympathy; but the power and field of effectuality of this force in us are small, the psychic movement that prompts it is incomplete, its action often ignorant because there is contact of mind and heart but our being does not embrace the being of others as ourselves. An external unity with others must always be an outward joining and association of external lives with a minor inner result; the mind and heart attach their movements to this common life and the beings whom we meet there; but the common external life remains the foundation,—the inward constructed unity, ... The spiritual consciousness, the spiritual life reverses this principle of building; it bases its action in the collective life upon an inner experience and inclusion of others in our own being, an inner sense and reality of oneness. The spiritual individual acts out of that sense of oneness which gives him immediate and direct perception of the demand of self on other self, the need of the life, the good, the work of love and sympathy that can truly be done. A realisation of spiritual unity, a dynamisation of the intimate consciousness of one-being, of one self in all beings, can alone found and govern by its truth the action of the divine life.” (CWSA 22: 1066)

X—Unity Is In the Spiritual Consciousness

“It is only by feeling all things as one spiritual substance that one can arrive at unity—unity is in the spiritual consciousness. The material point is only one point among millions of millions—so that is not the base of unity. But once you get the unity in consciousness, you can feel through that the unity of mind substance, mind force, etc., the unity of life substance (mobile) and life force, the unity of material substance and energies.” (CWSA 30: 399)

“Unity does not come from any exterior disposition, but by becoming conscious of the eternal Oneness.” (CWM 15: 64)

“And in the mind again the conscious-power that should harmonise and unite is not only limited in its knowledge and in its will, but the knowledge and the will are disparate and often at discord. The principle of unity is above in the Supermind: for there alone is the conscious unity of all diversities; there alone will and knowledge are equal and in perfect harmony; there alone Consciousness and Force arrive at their divine equation.” (CWSA 21: 229)

XI—All Religions’ God-visions Could Embrace and Cast Themselves Into Each Other But Intellectual Dogma and Cult Egoism Stand In the Way

“Each religion has helped mankind. Paganism increased in man the light of beauty, the largeness and height of his life, his aim at a many-sided perfection; Christianity gave him some vision of divine love and charity; Buddhism has shown him a noble way to be wiser, gentler, purer, Judaism and Islam how to be religiously faithful in action and zealously devoted to God; Hinduism has opened to him the largest and profoundest spiritual possibilities. A great thing would be done if all these God-visions could embrace and cast themselves into each other; but intellectual dogma and cult egoism stand in the way.

All religions have saved a number of souls, but none yet has been able to spiritualise mankind. For that there is needed not cult and creed, but a sustained and all-comprehending effort at spiritual self-evolution.” (CWSA 13: 211)

XII—Until Spiritual Revolution Occurs the Sense of the Others Cannot Be Understood

“The changes we see in the world today are intellectual, moral, physical in their ideal and intention: the spiritual revolution waits for its hour and throws up meanwhile its waves here and there. Until it comes the sense of the others cannot be understood and till then all interpretation of present happening and forecast of man's future are vain things. For its nature, power, event are that which will determine the next cycle of our humanity.” (CWSA 13: 211)

XIII—Nations Do Not Listen to Any True Spiritual Message

“Speak to us at the level of the nations.

Alas! If I did it would not be from a very high level!

The nations, as yet, do not seem ready to listen to any true spiritual message.” (CWM 15: 60)

XIV—Governments Must Be Truthful and Sincere in Their International Dealings

“The earth will enjoy a lasting and living peace only when men understand that they must be truthful and sincere even in their international dealings.

For the Governments honesty lies not only in saying what they are doing but also in doing what they say.” (CWM 15: 58)

XV—If Diplomacy Becomes the Instrument of the Truth, It Will Be a Big Step Towards Human Unity

“If diplomacy could become the instrument of the Truth and the Divine Grace, instead of being based on duplicity and falsehood, a big step would be taken towards human unity and harmony.” (CWM 15: 59)

XVI—The External Union of Mankind Depends on Man’s Goodwill and Sincerity

“The unity of humanity is an underlying and existing fact.

But the external union of mankind depends on man’s goodwill and sincerity.” (CWM 15: 66)

XVII—If You Want Union in the World, First Unify the Different Parts of Your Own Being

“If you want peace upon earth,

first establish peace in your heart.

If you want union in the world,

first unify the different parts of your own being.” (CWM 15: 65)

“What is the right way of achieving lasting world unity?

“To realise the Consciousness of the ONE.” (CWM 15: 61)

“Prove to the World the possibility of Union by being united among yourselves.” (CWM 15: 66)

“Shake off all narrowness, selfishness, limitations, and wake up to the consciousness of Human Unity. This is the only way to achieve peace and harmony.” (CWM 15: 59)

XVIII—In All Countries There Are People Who Believe That a New World Based on Truth Wants to Take Birth

“(Message for the Sri Aurobindo Birth Centenary set of photographs and messages, issued by the Sri Aurobindo Society and sent to the embassies of many nations)

“A new world, based on Truth and refusing the old slavery to falsehood, wants to take birth.

In all countries there are people who know it, at least feel it.

To them we call:

“Will you collaborate?” (CWM 15: 62)

Section Sixteen: The Ideal of Human Unity Is Vaguely Making Its Way

I—The Ideal of Human Unity Will Be the Determining Forces of the Future

“Today the ideal of human unity is more or less vaguely making its way to the front of our consciousness. The emergence of an ideal in human thought is always the sign of an intention in Nature, but not always of an intention to accomplish; sometimes it indicates only an attempt which is predestined to temporary failure. For Nature is slow and patient in her methods. She takes up ideas and half carries them out, then drops them by the wayside to resume them in some future era with a better combination. She tempts humanity, her thinking instrument, and tests how far it is ready for the harmony she has imagined; she allows and incites man to attempt and fail, so that he may learn and succeed better another time. Still the ideal, having once made its way to the front of thought, must certainly be attempted, and this ideal of human unity is likely to figure largely among the determining forces of the future; for the intellectual and material circumstances of the age have prepared and almost impose it, especially the scientific discoveries which have made our earth so small that its vastest kingdoms seem now no more than the provinces of a single country.” (CWSA 25: 280)

II—The Unity of Mankind Is Part of Nature's Eventual Scheme and Must Come About

“Yet the unity of mankind is evidently a part of Nature's eventual scheme and must come about. Only it must be under other conditions and with safeguards which will keep the race intact in the roots of its vitality, richly diverse in its oneness.” (CWSA 25: 284)

III—The Ideal of Human Unity Will Create a Firm Ground of Peace and Harmony

“The indwelling deity who presides over the destiny of the race has raised in man's mind and heart the idea, the hope of a new order which will replace the old unsatisfactory order and substitute for it conditions of the world's life which will in the end have a reasonable chance of establishing permanent peace and well-being. This would for the first time turn into an assured fact the ideal of human unity which, cherished by a few, seemed for so long a noble chimera; then might be created a firm ground of peace and harmony and even a free room for the realisation of the highest human dreams, for the perfectibility of the race, a perfect society, a higher upward evolution of the human soul and human nature. It is for the men of our day and, at the most, of tomorrow to give the answer…. A new, a difficult and uncertain beginning might have to be made in the midst of the chaos and ruin after perhaps an extermination on a large scale, and a more successful creation could be predicted only if a way was found to develop a better humanity or perhaps a greater, a superhuman race.” (CWSA 25: 586)

IV—A Psychological Force Which Tends to Break the Formula of the Nation and Aspires to Create a Single Nation of Mankind

“There is, however, at work a more powerful force, a sort of intellectual religion of humanity, clear in the minds of the few, vaguely felt in its effects and its disguises by the many, which has largely helped to bring about much of the trend of the modern mind and the drift of its developing institutions. This is a psychological force which tends to break beyond the formula of the nation and aspires to replace the religion of country and even, in its more extreme forms, to destroy altogether the national sentiment and to abolish its divisions so as to create the single nation of mankind.” (CWSA 25: 573)

V—There Is Divine Reality in Which Whole Humanity Is One

“A religion of humanity means the growing realisation that there is a secret Spirit, a divine Reality, in which we are all one, that humanity is its highest present vehicle on earth, that the human race and the human being are the means by which it will progressively reveal itself here. It implies a growing attempt to live out this knowledge and bring about a kingdom of this divine Spirit upon earth. By its growth within us oneness with our fellow-men will become the leading principle of all our life, not merely a principle of cooperation but a deeper brotherhood, a real and an inner sense of unity and equality and a common life. There must be the realisation by the individual that only in the life of his fellow-men is his own life complete. There must be the realisation by the race that only on the free and full life of the individual can its own perfection and permanent happiness be founded. There must be too a discipline and a way of salvation in accordance with this religion, that is to say, a means by which it can be developed by each man within himself, so that it may be developed in the life of the race. To go into all that this implies would be too large a subject to be entered upon here; it is enough to point out that in this direction lies the eventual road. No doubt, if this is only an idea like the rest, it will go the way of all ideas. But if it is at all a truth of our being, then it must be the truth to which all is moving and in it must be found the means of a fundamental, an inner, a complete, a real human unity which would be the one secure base of a unification of human life. A spiritual oneness which would create a psychological oneness not dependent upon any intellectual or outward uniformity and compel a oneness of life not bound up with its mechanical means of unification, but ready always to enrich its secure unity by a free inner variation and a freely varied outer self-expression, this would be the basis for a higher type of human existence.

Could such a realisation develop rapidly in mankind, we might then solve the problem of unification in a deeper and truer way from the inner truth to the outer forms. Until then, the attempt to bring it about by mechanical means must proceed. But the higher hope of humanity lies in the growing number of men who will realise this truth and seek to develop it in themselves, so that when the mind of man is ready to escape from its mechanical bent,—perhaps when it finds that its mechanical solutions are all temporary and disappointing,—the truth of the Spirit may step in and lead humanity to the path of its highest possible happiness and perfection.” (CWSA 25: 577–578)

VI—Spiritual Religion of Humanity Is the Hope of the Future

“The unity of the human race, even if achieved, can only be made real if the religion of humanity, which is at present the highest active ideal of mankind, spiritualises itself and becomes the general inner law of human life.” (CWSA 25: 570)

“A spiritual religion of humanity is the hope of the future. By this is not meant what is ordinarily called a universal religion, a system, a thing of creed and intellectual belief and dogma and outward rite. Mankind has tried unity by that means; it has failed and deserved to fail, because there can be no universal religious system, one in mental creed and vital form. The inner spirit is indeed one, but more than any other the spiritual life insists on freedom and variation in its self-expression and means of development.” (CWSA 25: 577

Section Seventeen: Govern India through Union of All Political Parties

I—The Time Has Come to Govern Through Union, Mutual Understanding and Collaboration

(Messages for Mrs. Indira Gandhi, Prime Minister of India, who visited the Ashram)

“Let India work for the future and set the example. Thus she will recover her true place in the world.

Since long it was the habit to govern through division and opposition.

The time has come to govern through union, mutual understanding and collaboration.

To choose a collaborator, the value of the man is more important than the party to which he belongs.

The greatness of a country does not depend on the victory of a party but on the union of all the parties.”  (CWM 13: 369)

II—Governing by Fear To Be Replaced by the Government of Love

(Message for broadcast by All India Radio, Pondicherry)

“We want to be messengers of light and truth. At once a future of harmony offers itself to be proclaimed to the world.

The time has come for the old habit of governing by fear to be replaced by the government of love.” (CWM 13: 370)

III—Political Unity Can Be Prepared by Men of All Parts of the Country and Creating of a Single National Government

“Moreover, political unity which is an essential condition of independence differs from unity of ideas and methods which are not essential. Political unity can be prepared by men of all parts of the country joining in a common struggle for the creation of a single national government, but the other unity is only possible if the whole nation is inspired by on spirit and one idea.” (CWSA 7: 763)

IV—One Should Wage a War of Ideas So That the Truth May Triumph, Not a War of Personalities

“Completely give up this ordinary vulgar political practice of publicly abusing people either in speech or writing. One should wage a war of ideas so that the truth may triumph, not a war of personalities.” (CWM 15: 56)

V—On the Quality of Ideas Depends the Quality of the Organisation

“Idea: essential for all organisers; on its quality depends the quality of the organisation.” (CWM 15: 59)

VI—There Is a Sufficient Force and Manhood in Us to Create Unity and Brotherhood to Which We Should Direct Our Whole Efforts

“But the country, the swadesh, which must be the base and fundament of our nationality, is India, a country where Mahomedan and Hindu live intermingled and side by side. What geographical base can a Hindu nationality possess? Maharashtra and Rajasthan are no longer separate geographical units but merely provincial divisions of a single country. The very first requisite of a Hindu nationalism is wanting. The Mahomedans base their separateness and their refusal to regard themselves as Indians first and Mahomedans afterwards on the existence of great Mahomedan nations to which they feel themselves more akin, in spite of our common birth and blood, than to us. Hindus have no such resource. For good or evil, they are bound to the soil and to the soil alone. They cannot deny their Mother, neither can they mutilate her. Our ideal therefore is an Indian Nationalism, largely Hindu in its spirit and traditions, because the Hindu made the land and the people and persists, by the greatness of his past, his civilisation and his culture and his invincible virility, in holding it, but wide enough also to include the Moslem and his culture and traditions and absorb them into itself. It is possible that the Mahomedan may not recognise the inevitable future and may prefer to throw himself into the opposite scale. If so, the Hindu, with what little Mahomedan help he may get, must win Swaraj both for himself and the Mahomedan in spite of that resistance. There is a sufficient force and manhood in us to do a greater and more difficult task than that, but we lack unity, brotherhood, intensity of single action among ourselves. It is to the creation of that unity, brotherhood and intensity that the Hindu Sabha should direct its whole efforts. Otherwise we must reject it as a disruptive and not a creative agency.” (CWSA 8: 305–306)

VII—India Has to Solve for the Human Race the Problem of Harmonising and Spiritualising Impulses towards Liberty, Equality and Fraternity

“We have to recover the Aryan spirit and ideal and keep it intact but enshrined in new forms and more expansive institutions. We have to treasure jealously everything in our social structure, manners, institutions, which is of permanent value, essential to our spirit or helpful to the future; but we must not cabin the expanding and aggressive spirit of India in temporary forms which are the creation of the last few hundred years. That would be a vain and disastrous endeavour. The mould is broken; we must remould in larger outlines and with a richer content. … We had to come to close quarters with that democratic organisation, draw it into ourselves and absorb the democratic spirit and methods so that we might rise beyond them. Our half-aristocratic half-theocratic feudalism had to be broken, in order that the democratic spirit of the Vedanta might be released and, by absorbing all that is needed of the aristocratic and theocratic culture, create for the Indian race a new and powerful political and social organisation. We have to learn and use the democratic principle and methods of Europe, in order that hereafter we may build up something more suited to our past and to the future of humanity. We have to throw away the individualism and materialism and keep the democracy. We have to solve for the human race the problem of harmonising and spiritualising its impulses towards liberty, equality and fraternity. In order that we may fulfil our mission we must be masters in our own home.” (CWSA 8: 247–248)

“It has been said that democracy is based on the rights of man; it has been replied that it should rather take its stand on the duties of man; but both rights and duties are European ideas. Dharma is the Indian conception in which rights and duties lose the artificial antagonism created by a view of the world which makes selfishness the root of action, and regain their deep and eternal unity. Dharma is the basis of democracy which Asia must recognise, for in this lies the distinction between the soul of Asia and the soul of Europe. Through Dharma the Asiatic evolution fulfils itself; this is her secret.” (CWSA 7: 932)

The concept of Dharma.

“Dharma in the spiritual sense is not morality or ethics. Dharma, says the Gita elsewhere, is action governed by the swabhava, the essential law of one's nature. And this swabhava is at its core the pure quality of the spirit in its inherent power of conscious will and in its characteristic force of action.” (CWSA 19: 275)

“Dharma in the language of the Gita means the innate law of the being and its works and an action proceeding from and determined by the inner nature, svabhāva-niyataṁ karma. In the lower ignorant consciousness of mind, life and body there are many dharmas, many rules, many standards and laws because there are many varying determinations and types of the mental, vital and physical nature. The immortal Dharma is one; it is that of the highest spiritual divine consciousness and its powers, parā prakṛtiḥ. It is beyond the three gunas, and to reach it all these lower dharmas have to be abandoned, sarva-dharmân parityajya.” (CWSA 19: 405–406)

The lists of other compilation e-books on the topics related to the sadhana are as follows.

1. SURRENDER In the Integral Yoga

2. ASPIRATION In the Integral Yoga

3. REJECTION In the Integral Yoga Part I

4. REJECTION In the Integral Yoga Part II

5. Conquering Obstacles in Sadhana

6. LOVE FOR THE DIVINE

7. Bhakti Yoga: The Yoga of Devotion

8. The Supreme Divine Love

9. Preparing for Yoga Through Human Love

10. The Descent of Spiritual Peace

11. Peace is Most Needed in Sadhana

12. To Prepare for Spiritual Life Cultivate Equality

13. Necessity for Spiritual Perfection is Perfect Equality

14. Fundamental Faith Required in Yoga

15. Faith Precedes Spiritual Experience

16. Regain Faith if Faith Falters

17. Cure from Illness by Faith

18. COURAGE in SADHANA

19. HUMILITY in SADHANA

20. SINCERITY IN SADHANA

21. How to Become ABSOLUTELY SINCERE

22. Insincerity Can Be Changed in Yoga

23. To Succeed in Sadhana Aspire Sincerely

24. PERSEVERANCE in SADHANA

25. All Is She

26. RECEPTIVITY in SADHANA

27. FAITHFULNESS in SADHANA

28. MODESTY in SADHANA

29. Generosity in Sadhana

30. PATIENCE in SADHANA

31. Cheerfulness in Sadhana

32. Meditation, Concentration and Contemplation in Sadhana

33. Namjapa of Mantra in Sadhana

34. Seek Spiritual Progress in Happiness

35. Silence in Sadhana

36. Status of Silence in the Infinite

37. Concentration in Spiritual Life

38. Work in Sadhana

39. Work Is Indispensable in Sadhana of Integral Yoga

40. The Gita’s Gospel of Works

41. Gratitude towards the Divine

42. Pain the Hammer of the Gods

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