Veerampattinam Kali
Thursday November 18 2004 08:05 IST
By Karmayogi
A few miles away from Pondicherry is a hamlet called Veerampattinam.
It is called pattinam as places on the coast are called thus in ancient Tamilnadu,
such as Nagapattinam, Kaveripoompattinam, Devanampattinam.
The temple there is famous. Its annual festival falls on a Friday in August. Sometimes
it coincides with August 15th or falls around that date. This temple draws very
large crowds for its annual festival and people from around twenty or thirty
miles radius attend it.
The two major events are fire walking and the sacrifice of chickens. Kali
enjoys both very much.
In the thirties and forties, Mother used to drive up to Cuddalore or even to
Chidambaram in the afternoons. Every day She would take a road different from
the previous day. During one such drive, She visited Chidambaram.
A young man with a psychic opening saw the Mother, not knowing who She was at
that time. His life flowered, his children came to Mother and he himself passed
away on November 17th, 1973, the day when She attained Samadhi. Once She was
stopped on the road by the surging crowd of the Veermapattinam festival.
Her car had to stop. Just then, Kali came to Her – She is the Mother of all
these deities and gods – and spoke with great pleasure, ‘‘Today I
had many more chickens than usual, because you have come. Please come more
often.'' Mother has narrated this little incident in Her Agenda.
She had a Ganesh statue as a paper weight. At Her touch, Ganesh emerged out of
it. She asked him in surprise, ‘‘So, you are real, is
it?'' Ganesh spoke and was all smiles, ‘‘Of course,
here I am.'' Mother had Her occult training in Algeria from an adept who
called himself Theon, meaning God. Because of that training, She could call any
of these gods who generally obliged Her.
Sri Aurobindo confined Himself to yogic discipline and did not stray into
occultism. The yogic power includes occult power. If summoned, it can come to
the surface. Sitting in His massive sofa chair, once he spoke to a sadhak in
the room, saying, ‘‘I am trying to see what Rishabhchand is doing
in his house.''
Mother called the beings that were throwing stones into Her house when a
magician-cook practised his art on them. The stones fell from the ceiling
everywhere in all the rooms. They did not hurt anyone. They fell everywhere,
except in the rooms of Sri Aurobindo. Half a dozen of the deities lined up in
the air at Her call.
They offered to surrender to Her. To Her query on what they could do, they
answered that they could throw stones! Durga, Rishis, Indra and other gods used
to come to the mediation hall and perch on the cornices waiting for Mother to
come for the meditation.