journal d'une transition

1405

Because it is the symbol of immortality, because it is the source and centre of Auroville. Because traditionally in India the banyan tree is believed to be inhabited by a divine force and thus venerated as a holy presence. Since olden times women have painted its trunk with white chalk and tied a red thread around it to worship the sacred banyan tree. Because it is the seed of the banyan tree that contains the nature of creation, says an old Hindu story. The story goes that the sage Uddalaka once asked his young son to break open a fruit of the banyan and find out what was within. The boy saw only tiny seeds. The father asked the boy to break open the seeds and see what was within. ‘There is nothing at all’, said the boy. ‘My son, that unseen subtle essence within the seed contains the huge Nyagrodha banyan’, said Uddalaka. ‘In that unseen essence all things exist. It is the Truth. It is the Self. And thou art that.’ That is why traditionally, before cutting any branch, or root, or trunk, of a banyan tree, one should perform a special puja in order to appease the wounded spirit of the tree, to ask for permission from the earth which sustains the tree and from the beings that under and among its branches find shelter. Mother knew this very well, so well that She asked the workers at Matrimandir’s site not to hammer any nails into the trunk of ‘our’ banyan tree. Since then, so many years have passed and our banyan tree has grown in size and strength, secondary trunks have developed beside the main original one, and many aerial roots have found their way down to the ground to support the growth of the most outreaching branches. Or at least this was true before last February 15 th . On that day a group of people approached the banyan tree armed with long ladders and electric saws and different kinds of blades and axes, and started to energetically cut aerial roots and branches and secondary trunks. On that day I tried to ask these people if they were conscious of what they were doing. I tried to ask them why they were cutting the aerial roots (four of them were chopped in the end) around the main trunk, the very roots which might have given the trunk the support it needed in the future because of the fungal infection which is making it hollow and die. I am repeatedly writing ‘I tried’ because I was not even allowed to give full expression to these questions. Those people kicked me away without listening to me and aggressively proclaiming: ‘You are nothing. Go away from here. You are nothing.’ The only question of mine which got an answer was a desperate ‘Who gave you permission for this, since no expert has been called yet to give a final evaluation about what should be done?’ The architect answered this question. And his answer was: ‘ I gave permission.’ Well, I thought that in Auroville everybody was ‘something’, that decisions were taken collectively, questions answered, promises kept. I was wrong. Not only our sacred banyan tree has been brutally treated and more than 30 aerial roots, small and big, have been cut, and long, big branches have been ‘pruned’, but the way this has been done shows that the people who did the job (who are doing the job, as they have not stopped yet, as they have brought their electric saws and blades and axes under the banyan tree again after the recent celebrations) do not know much of the life of banyan trees. They do not seem to know that very often the main trunk after a number of years dies and is replaced by the aerial roots which reaching the ground have grown into new trunks for the support and life of the tree. They do not seem to know that to live and prosper a banyan tree needs aerial roots to reach the ground and support the branches which otherwise will crack under the weight of their length or the force of a storm; they do not seem to know that one of the oldest banyan trees in India has more than 230 supporting roots and 3000 secondary trunks, or that O.T. Ravindran, one of India’s best known