with Sri Ganesh

them in dispersing the ashes: they had decided to throw half of the ashes in the sea, facing the Ashram, and to bury the other half in the garden of Sri Ganesh. I arranged for a gathering at the temple. Before that, I joined them, along with Manikandan, at the harbor; they had hired a small boat; we sailed into the ocean, perhaps half a mile out, and navigated till we could clearly see the Ashram main building west of us; we let part of her ashes, wrapped in a cloth with stones and some things Madhu chose, drop into the deep, while Madhu chanted some mantras. The ceremony at the temple was quiet; we were all there, along with other Aurovilians who had loved her, and a few people from the Ashram; I had prepared everything and chosen a spot near to the temple where we could plant a sapling of a hibiscus shrub – the one called Agni. Both the sons left soon after. I had assumed they would respect her personal things, her diaries, and her mementoes of her sadhana with Mother and Sri Aurobindo; I had obtained from the residents in “Promesse” the agreement that her rooms would be left untouched for a year. I had briefly discussed with her sons the best way to keep her things: my suggestion was to gather all her diaries and such and have them kept in the Auroville Archives. There had been no objection from them. Over the years, and especially since I had redone her rooms, Kusum had wanted me to re-arrange everything in them; I had made for her a special wooden cabinet to keep all that had to do with Sri Ganesh, Mother and Sri Aurobindo; I knew where everything was: her books of photographs of her family, her personal papers, her bank papers, her files of freedom fighter, her correspondence, her clothes, etc. It was in that special cabinet that I found the open letters she had prepared stating her wishes in the event of her death, and appointing me as her successor in the service to the Ganesh temple – letters which she had placed there without showing them to me. Naturally, I wanted to put some order into all of it, and dispose of the dross, and keep ready what would go to the Archives, what would remain at the temple, what would go to her family. In the weeks and months that followed, the relation between us deteriorated.

Here are some of the letters she had written and kept in that cabinet; the first one, chronologically, was addressed to:

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