Which town?

42

In order to complete the cemtral monument, its decor and its setting, without having to deal with further substantial objections of any sort, R., in collusion with the Chairman, obtained that through an official edict, the first of the kind to intervene into the community affairs, all sources of questioning be neutralized = those persons who insisted that all the elements complementary to the principal edifice be respected and preserved such as the outer gardens, the trees, Nature’s positive presence.

*

Today, out of the few millions of persons who have come near to the Matrimandir or were allowed to enter it in the course of the past ten years or so, how many, if asked, would be able to explain its raison d’etre and function? What the majority of visitors recall is this image of a golden globe shimmering in the sunlight, surrounded with red stone and ornamental rockeries, flanked by a large banyan tree and an amphitheater where, on certain occasions of silent collective gatherings, a great vigorous fire is lit to greet the dawn – the pictures of which are usuallly published in the newspapers. They generally understand, for having read or heard it, that it is the centre of an international township enjoying the support of the central Government of India, a town under construction where already reside a number of researchers, artists and creators. But what purpose does this globe, in fact, serve? Very few would hazard a guess. Some of them were let in and could enter the inner Chamber and sit in it a moment, under surveillance : they will surely remember the silence, the placement of the constituting elements (the crystal, the symbols, the

298