Congress to extend support to today’s bandh

The Hindu

20 December, 2014

R. Sivaraman

The main opposition Congress party on Friday extended its support to the bandh call given by political outfits and social organisations. They have called for the dawn-to-dusk bandh on December 20 demanding that the Union and Puducherry governments take over Sri Aurobindo Ashram.

Talking to reporters, Leader of Opposition and senior Congress Leader V.Vaithilingam said his party would extend full support to the bandh.

He said, “The death of three women has shocked the people. Even illegal encroachers would be evicted only after providing alternative accommodation to them. The sisters were evicted without providing any alternative accommodation.”

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Agitation still rocks Puducherry on Ashram issue

The Hindu   20 December, 2014

Residents of Vazhaikulam protesting before Ambabhikshu Apartments

Photo: T. Singaravelou

Trustees held responsible for death of 3 women

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Bandh tomorrow for govt. takeover of ashram

The Hindu

December 19, 2014

Puducherry sisters’ death

A host of outfits and civil society organisations have called for a dawn-to-dusk bandh on December 20 demanding that the Union and Puducherry governments should intervene and take over Sri Aurobindo Ashram. A decision to this effect was taken at a joint meeting here on Thursday.

G. Sugumaran, secretary, Federation for Peoples Rights (FPR), said the Central government should intervene and appoint a senior IAS official to look after the administration of the Ashram.

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Aurobindo Ashram Turns Inhuman, Evicts Family from Earth

MF Monitor

December 18, 2014

Established in Pondicherry by Sri Aurobindo on 24 November 1926, the Aurobindo Ashram turned into a villain to a family of seven in less than a century.

A 2002 case involving the Ashram and the five sisters in a long-drawn legal battle ended on Dec. 9 with a Supreme Court direction to get the sisters thrown out within 7 days from the Ambabhikshu House.

The five hapless sisters had submitted a joint letter to the Trustees of Sri Aurobindo Ashram on December 15 that they would end their lives if forced to leave.

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Tension prevails in Pondy

The Times of India

Tension prevails in Pondy after three of a family commit suicide; protesters attack Aurobindo Ashram

Bosco Dominique,TNN | Dec 18, 2014, 03.39 PM IST

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Sisters evicted from Aurobindo Ashram: Three including mother commit suicide

ABP Live

PTI

Thursday, 18 December 2014 02:47 PM

Puducherry:  An entire family - five sisters and their parents - jumped into the sea here this morning, a day after they were evicted from the famous Aurobindo Ashram.

Two of the young women and their mother have died, the police said, while the father and three other daughters were rescued by fishermen and have been hospitalized.

The family is from Bihar. The five sisters had been staying in the residential part of the Aurobindo Ashram for several years; their parents lived near-by.

The trust that runs the ashram had 10 years ago accused one of the sisters of misconduct.  Earlier this month, the Supreme Court ruled in favour of the trust and said the sisters should vacate their rooms within a week; if they refused, the court said, the police should evict them.

Yesterday, they warned to kill themselves if they were moved out, but later were escorted out by the police after extensive talks.

http://www.abplive.in/india/2014/12/18/article457316.ece/Sisters-evicted-from-Aurobindo-Ashram--Three-including-mother-commit-suicide

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Quo Vadis? by Sampdas – Response to Ritwik Banerjee

Apropos “An Earnest Appeal” by Shri Ritwik Banerjee, let it be noted that there are disciples and devotees of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother – both within the Pondicherry outfit and outside – who are very much perturbed by the manner in which the Masters are denigrated by a handful of influential persons, possibly encouraged and egged on to such vicious efforts by those who are close to the Trustees of the Ashram. On the other hand, the silent majority are perhaps hapless witnesses to it – counting their day to day rations – since they have no other go if they are thrown out of the Ashram. The junta that rules now has the leverage to muzzle dissent into submission by denying food and medical facilities to those who owe allegiance to Sri Aurobindo and The Mother, and who dare to protest against atrocities not only against human beings but against the Divine as well. The protestors on the other hand appear to have been carrying on their crusade as a sacred duty to ensure that the Masters are not denigrated in the very Ashram which bears the name of the Pioneers of the New Age.

There are many like me who share the concern for the need to cure this festering wound in time so that it does not become a gangrene threatening the very fundamentals of the spiritual endeavour of sincere disciples and devotees.

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An Earnest Appeal – by Ritwik Banerjee

Dear Sir & Madam,

I don't know who or who has not has read the last mail/forwards on the subject. Even a single response on any point can ensure some peace of mind to its sender. Kindly let all Aurobindonians know your response thereby on the following counts:

1) Are The Golden Chain Fraternity & its work maintained by Ashram in any manner?

2) What are its goal & agenda?

3) Do you agree with a biography of the Master published in 2008 by the Columbia University Press? Was it warranted?

4) Don't you think its author has spent four decades in the Ashram with you in some way betraying the Ashram?

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On Manoj Das’s Clarification with Regard to the Seashore Chit Fund Scam – by an Inmate of the Ashram

We, the devotees of the Mother and Sri Aurobindo in Odisha, read on 28.10.2014 in the Odiya dailies about Shri Manoj Das’s clarification “Kinchit hatachakita jane lekhakara prashna o pratibedana” [a befuddled writer’s question and submission] regarding his involvement with the scam-tainted Seashore Chit Fund. Since we feel sorry for such a famous writer like him getting involved in such dubious money matters, and as we found some discrepancies in the submission of his position to the dailies, we request him to provide further clarifications. Besides, since we are associated with Sri Aurobindo Ashram for a long time, the magical word craft of Shri Manoj Das cannot sway us enough to lose sight of the reality staring at us.

Here are the following discrepancies: -

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More Facts on the Domestic Bills of Ashram Aristocrats — by An Irrational Ashramite

Fact 1: The Trust provided a measly allowance for engaging domestic workers only to Ashramites permitted by the Mother or by any Managing Trustee. Not to each inmate as Bireshwar unwittingly put it (see this post); e.g. among those deserving it but who were denied, is a 60+ year old whose arthritic hands don’t let him to wash his clothes.

The term ‘inmate’ craftily legitimised by the present Trust Board is another can of worms – it covers the full, half, quarter, and occasional ‘inmate’!

Fact 2: First, the Trust blamed its sudden “dire need of funds” on the Government for forcing it to decriminalize its allowance partly built on the pretext: “Most domestics are fat and irregular, hence well-off”. Sly as ever, it sweet-talked the unworldly inmates to “voluntarily reduce” their allowances, then capriciously hacked it – “often despite the inmate’s old age infirmities” as Bireshwar says.

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Review of “An Atrocious Biography” – Aron Aronite

From the grammatically inaccurate term ‘Lives’ gets unleashed this narrative style of insinuations about Sri Aurobindo – as if the Mystic led double lives, one imagined for him by himself which his followers and the world began believing as well, while the other ‘human aspect’ to be exclusively discovered through this self-appointed and ambidextrous style of writing pseudo history. Deshpande shows how each left handed compliment accompanies a dismissive, negativist, suggestive insinuation about Sri Aurobindo.

In fact only when we read R.Y. Deshpande’s Atrocious Biography, it gets clear how academia and intellectuals get honey trapped by this irreverence towards a Spiritual Stalwart, forgetting the fact that the gems they hurry to attest as scintillating insights are from someone who has no academic grounding, no formal education in history writing and doesn’t even have a post graduation, least of all a PhD in historiography or any mentionable qualifications in any other discipline. If we are to go by R.Y. Deshpande, we are hearing the "brilliant" (!) take of an American ‘taxi cab driver and a high school dropout’ on one of twentieth century’s most profound Mystic, and a Cambridge alumni who was proposed the Noble prize for Literature. 

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The Domestic Bills of the Ashram Aristocrats – by Bireshwar Choudhury

The Sri Aurobindo Ashram Trust pays each inmate of the Ashram a monthly allowance for engaging domestic workers to help them in their daily chores. Recently the minimum wages of domestic workers has been hiked up by the Government to around Rs 150 rupees a day, which comes to around Rs 4500 a month. As the Ashram Trust could not afford to pay the higher wages, it drastically reduced the number of hours of domestic help for the inmates. For example, those inmates who had been sanctioned eight hours of domestic help have now been re-sanctioned only four hours to match their existing allowance. Those who had only four hours have now got only two hours despite, in a few cases, their old age infirmities. But what is really shocking is that the allowances of Jhumur Bhattacharya and Gauri Pinto, two elderly highfalutin ladies of the Ashram, have not been touched at all! Why? Because they enjoy the favour of the present administration and were once upon a time in the early days of the Ashram School “very close to the Mother”, which now seems to be the standard excuse for being thoroughly spoilt.

Guess how much they receive as allowance for their domestic helpers – more than Rs 20.000/ each!

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