François Gautier
15th August is a magic date also for me: first it is Sri Aurobindo’s birthday, my guru and the one who has guided me all my life.
Secondly, I started from Paris and drove to Delhi with a caravan of five cars, crossing eleven countries when I had just completed by 18th year.
I spent my first night in the sri Aurobindo ashram, Delhi, where I will be actually today the 15th August 2021.
There, I had a powerful inner experience: That there was an ancient, secret knowledge embedded in the very soil of this country, that would help me to discover – who am I? why life? Why death? & so many secrets of the Divine Consciousness
That I would spend all the rest of my life in India
That I would also spend it defending this Knowledge and this marvellous country, which adopted me from the first day
And this is what I did, first by writing articles in newspapers like the Hindustan Times, Blitz, The Indian Express (Ferengi’s Column), Rediff.com etc.
I then became an international journalist for major French newspapers such as Le Journal de Genève or Le Figaro, always trying to defend India’s point of view. I have interviewed 8 Prime Ministers of India.
Then I came to books. My first editor was Sitaram Goel, a gentleman and a pioneer in defending Hindus – when it was not fashionable. He asked me to write a compilation of my articles. Since then I have written 30 books, both in English and French, mostly trying o correct the wrong depicting of Indian History, but also attempting to enlighten the French speaking people about pranayama, yoga or Ayurveda.
But I felt that articles and books were not enough, as both have a limited life, in spite of the Internet. Thus I decided to build a museum, to depict Indian History as it happened – not as it has been written. Sri Sri Ravi Shankar gave our trust FACT, 5 acres of land near the Pune airport and this is where, my wife Namrita and I started building this Museum, thanks to the Natchiketa Award of Excellence in Journalism given to me in 2005 by PM Vajpayee, with a cheque of 50.000 Rs. First with a shrine, dedicated to Mother India, She who has guided me all along, in spite of all my faults. Then erecting building after building, designing exhibition after exhibition – first depicting tyrants as they were, such Aurangzeb or Tippu Sultan (according their own records); then glorifying heroes and heroines of India: Shivaji Mahjaraj of course – thanks to him, Indians from Mumbai to Kanyakumari, have a better preserved culture, more safety for their women, softer social environment; but also Maharana Pratap, the only Rajput who fought the Moghols (and actually defeated Akbar’s army in Hadilghati), to Ahilyabai Holkar, Tarabai or Rani Kittur Chennama, glorious queens who incarnated the Shakti’s eternal power of India. We also have exhibitions on the Vedas, the Bhagavad Gita, or the four ashramas of life.
So on this 15th August 2021, I render homage and bow down to Mother India.
Namaste
Read More: An Entirely New History of India
Read More: In defence of the Vedas—a powerful force to decolonise the mind, Francois Gautier
(The article was first published in Francois Gautier’s official blog and has been republished with permission. Views expressed are personal)
