The Miracle of Kilvenmani

The awarding of both an Opus Prize and the Right Livelihood Award to Krishnammal this year are truly extraordinary events. But the reality is that these are not the most momentous occasions in the recent life of Land for Tillers Freedom.

In July 2007, three cars pulled up to LAFTI’s headquarters in Kuthur. A group of clearly very wealthy men emerged from each. These men, some very old, and some in the prime of life, and some with their wives and children, were the landlords (and their descendents) responsible for the burning alive of the 4wwomen and children in the village of Kilvenmani on that fateful Christmas Night, 1968, the 44th, an infant, found pinioned to a tree, a knife through its heart. This was the night that launched Krishnammal on her second life’s journey, to rescue the Dalit families of Nagai and Tiruvarur Districts from their milleninum-long servitude.

They came bearing garlands, and fruit, and papers. Lots of papers. They were here to gift their land - all of it - to Krishnammal and the people she serves, an act of restorative justice so surreal as to be almost unfathomable to people who have not followed the course of the struggle for these four decades. The beatings, the imprisonments, the hardships and deprivations, the days, month, years, and decades of “no conflict, no compromise” - Krishnammal’s motto - have now resulted in an act of contrition and atonement that is virtually beyond the imagination.

Some of the land around Kilvenmani had already been wrested from the landlords’ control in the nonviolent struggles that took place in the 1970s, but the symbolism here was unmistakable. An observer noted that the members of the community receiving the land were anxious to shake hands with all parties to the transaction, these same people whose touch only 30 years earlier would have been considered absolutely polluting.

To be sure, the landlords and their descendents are not now about to endure poverty. Most of them have gone off to India’s burgeoning cities, where the majority are sure to prosper. Others have gone to America and elsewhere to seek their fortune. “I don’t wish to deprive them,” says Krishnammal, “they too have marriages and births and occasions of their own to celebrate, and they must be allowed that privilege.”

But the land, and the scene of horrific struggles, and the commitment of a very, very small band of Gandhian organizers identifying themselves completely with the condition of the people, now belongs to the people, and, specifically, the women who till it.

One of the landlords, probably among the key perpetrators, gave Krishnammal the deed to his home. It is almost a palace. Asked whether she would live in it, Krishnammal laughs, “Of course not. Why would I choose to be a slave to a house that size? I sleep every night in a very small space, close to where I will be needed the next day, and how could I possibly care for such a thing?”

As has been the case with other houses gifted to LAFTI, it will now likely be used as a community center, or as a hostel for the children of Dalit migrant laborers.

* * * * *

Today, in the supermarket on Martin Luther King Day, I passed a young woman in the aisle I vaguely seemed to recognize. She definitely recognized me. It was Lauren McCann, the nine-year-old artist who drew the maps for The Color of Freedom. I didn’t recognize her fully because, well, after all, she is now 14.

So, in about three minutes, I explained to Lauren and her mother all the water that passed over the dam since then. The tsunami. The founding of the Friends of LAFTI Foundation. The new redistribution of land. Krishnammal’s tour of the U.S., and the Opus Prize. The Right Livelihood Award. It was like watching a fantastic movie passing before my eyes, and reminds me how intertwined my life has become with these extraordinary people, both in India, and those I have met along this journey. Oh, and I gave her the web address for this blog.

To all of you, thanks for enriching my life, even as we work together to help create and become witness to more miracles.

The Speech Krishnammal Didn't Give

As previously noted, at the Right Livelihood Award ceremonies on December 8th, Krishnammal did not deliver her prepared remarks, but spoke off-the-cuff and from the heart.

However, her prepared speech was a good one (and distributed to the press), so I am posting it below:

At the outset, I would like to thank the Right Livelihood Foundation, particularly Mr. Ole von Uexkull for visiting us in the Nagapattinam area of Tamil Nadu in South India, understanding our work and conferring this rare honor on Shri. Jagannathan, my life partner, and myself. I also wish to thank Mr. David Albert our long-time family friend and well-wisher of Land for Tillers’ Freedom, for nominating me for this most prestigious award. On this occasion, I am filled with gratitude to all the men and women in the LAFTI villages and the tireless staff of LAFTI who stand together in our mission to build a new, just and compassionate, Sarvodaya (welfare of all) community.

When I think of Right Livelihood, the following three aspects come to my mind: Right Vision, Right Thinking, and Right Action. This also reminds me of Lord Buddha who emphasized Right Thought, Right Speech, and Right Action, and also Swami Ramalinga, my spiritual mentor and guide, whose philosophy of love and compassion to all beings and the unity of all religious paths, has continued to inspire me since early in life.

Right Vision

Right Vision is fundamental to right living and I have been blessed with the company of many, ordinary person such as my mother, a peasant woman – who really wasn’t ordinary - to extraordinary luminaries such as Gandhi and Vinoba Bhave. From them and from the spiritual classics in Tamil, I began to develop a vision of compassion toward all beings, equanimity and benevolence.

After completing my primary school in the nearby village of Pattiveeranpatti, I traveled with my brother Muniyandi to the city of Madurai in the year 1936 to live in a hostel to pursue my secondary education. It was there, through the hostel warden that I came across the teachings of Swami Ramalinga Vallazhar, the late 19th Century Tamil poet and saint, whose appeal for simple living, high thinking, the inherent-divinity of all religions and unity of all paths, and compassion for all beings in the world touched my inner-being. The divine light lit by him continues to guide and expand my vision till this day.

The ancient spiritual classic of Tamilnadu, Thiruvasagam, explained the interconnectivity and evolution of man, much before Mendel and modern science, as below: (Amma sings this prayer-song in Tamil)

Pullahi, (became a grass)

Poodahi, Puzhuvai, Maramahi (to become, worm and other vegetations)

Paravai, Panbahi, (became birds and reptiles)

Palviruhamaahi, (took the form of the myriad other animals and beings)

Vallasurarahi, (to become a powerful-man)

Manitharai, Thevarai, Peyai, Kanangalai (To evolve as a human-the spiritual being, and higher manifestations)

Itthavara sangamuthul piranthileithen Yemperuman! (I am born into this confluence of creation, by the grace of you. Oh Lord!)

While the above prayer highlights the oneness of humanity with the rest of the beings on this planet earth, Swami Ramalinga expresses the height of compassion in the following words:

“Vadiya Payirai kandapothellam vadinene” (I suffer whenever I see the wilting plant).

My mother Nagammal had equally influenced me in developing compassion for my fellow beings, particularly the down-trodden and oppressed, herself being a ‘Dalit” (untouchable) woman, a member of the ostracized social class in India. While we were hosting a meal for visiting dignitaries and honorable guests at our home, she would sneak through the backdoor with food to give to someone hungry and needy in the neighborhood or in the street. This is the spirit of compassion that rushed me to Kilavenmani, the village where the hut in which 44 Dalit women and children sought shelter was torched on a Christmas night 1968 by landlords and their henchmen, in retaliation against the demand for higher wages. We have never rested since then, and have faced so many trials, struggles, and challenges over the past 40 years.

Right Thinking

I have been blessed to be in the company of Mahathma Gandhi, Acharya Vinoba Bhave, Shri Jeyaprakash Narayan and Shri. Shankar Rao Dev, to name some of the people who molded my thinking in the right path, inspiring me to lead a life dedicated toward the uplift of the landless poor, particularly women. They were the role models, living a life of renunciation and voluntary poverty, consuming less and less from Mother Earth, much before climate change and the perils of consumption were ever discussed or known to humanity.

I was inspired by Vinoba Bhave, Gandhi’s ‘spiritual guru’, who walked the length and breadth of India to find a nonviolent solution to end the suffering of the landless poor. I marched with Vinoba in his ‘Bhoodan (land-gift movement) movement’, the ‘silent revolution’ promoting social transformation. He appealed to the landlords to donate land to the village community, bringing about a paradigm shift in thinking, making the landlords and the landless-poor come together to share the resources of the community, voluntarily. Vinoba called himself a ‘spiritual terrorist’, setting fire to the hearts of people. I was fired within when I came to know the incident of carnage in Kilavenmani village and resolved to end to the suffering of the landless poor, in a nonviolent way.

Whether it is the land that provides sustainable livelihood for the American Indians, native Australians, or the landless peasants of India, or employment and food security for the poor and the needy, the change has to come from within the hearts and minds of people, prior to effecting sustainable change in the society. While the problems are global and at times seem insurmountable, they can be addressed locally, through nonviolent social action. Vinoba Bhave took Gandhi’s call for Gram Swaraj (independent, small, sustainable self-governing communities) one step further by giving a new slogan ‘Jai Jagat’ (‘Long Live the World’) -a world devoid of exploitation and suffering. This had given Jagannathan, my life partner, and myself a lifelong vocation, to spearhead the movement for Gram Swaraj in India, particularly in Tamil Nadu in southern India.

Right Action

Right and just action have been the corner stones of our life and I learnt the art and essence of Right and Just Social Action from Jagannathan who organized and held numerous Sathyagrahas (a term coined by Gandhi for non-violent social action/civil disobedience to address conflicts in society) in his life. On this occasion, I recollect with gratitude my godmother and mentor Dr. Soundram Ramachandran who not only inspired me to follow the path of Right Action, but also brought me and Shri. Jagannathan together when we were involved in constructive program at Gandhigram. Being as innovative in personal as in social life, Jagannathan gave me the wedding-dress (Saree) that he hand-spun himself in his chakra (spinning wheel) for 48 days. The momentum of his spinning chakra has never slackened, and led us in the path of dedicated social action, the movement that continues to this moment.

There are miles to go! But, it is immensely satisfying that through LAFTI, - the organization established by us - we have found ways to effect the peaceful transfer of land from landlords to 13,000 landless families in the Cauvery Delta region of Tamil Nadu. In Bodhgaya, Bihar, the place where Buddha attained Nirvana, a Mahant, the leader of a religious monastery, was sexually exploiting the women, keeping the villages under bonded-slavery. After three long years of people-participatory-social action, Shri. Jagannathan and I were able to relieve the sufferings of women from exploitation and bonded labor by distributing 24,000 acres of land among an equal number of families.

The attempt at social action with a spiritual bent of mind had taken us to remote corners of Tamil Nadu. During one of our ‘Gramswarajya padayatras’ (pilgrimage on foot to villages to promote Gandhiji’s vision self-ruling, self-sustaining villages), the people brought to our notice the destruction of the coastal ecosphere, due to the mushrooming shrimp farms. Jagannathan appealed to the Supreme Court of India and the team of scientists from the National Environmental Engineering Institute (NEERI) outlined clear guidelines and recommendations to protect the coastal ecology that had provided sustenance and livelihood to millions of people for thousands of years in the eastern-coast of peninsular India. The team of dedicated LAFTI workers is still working hard on this issue to implement the recommendations of the Supreme Court of India. Our struggle continues!

We believe the dream and social vision of Sarvodaya (Welfare of All), is possible through concerted, nonviolent, social action. In this context, the recognition the Right Livelihood Award provides is indeed a tribute to Gandhi and Vinoba, and the values of nonviolence, interreligious dialogue and amity, simple lifestyles, the high-thinking-low-energy-living that they stood for, and to all those inspired by them around the globe. In an increasingly complex and globalized world, with problems of climate change, conflicts in the name of religion and ethnicity, the values and methods of Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Mother Theresa, Nelson Mandela, and the Dalai Lama stand vindicated.

We have a lot to learn from the Swedish community, on the deeply held cultural and social notion of “Loggam”, akin to Buddha’s ‘Middle Path’. Your government and its policies of environmental protection and conservation, without compromising social justice and development are exemplary and a role model for the rest of the world. I sincerely believe that “everything is possible” when policies for sustainable development reflect people participation, ethical science, and right action.

I thank the Right Livelihood Foundation on behalf of the people of India, oppressed and suppressed people all over the world, the LAFTI family and supporters of LAFTI in India, Europe, Japan, and the United States for bestowing the highest honor on us.

I seek the blessings of Ramalinga Swami -whose Graceful-Divine-Light (Arut Perum Jyothi), and Greater Compassion (Thaniperum Karunai) has guided and blessed me all my life, for the well-being of each and every one of you here today, your families, and friends.

(Amma ends with the prayer in Tmail):

”Yellam Kaikoodum”(Everything will come to fruition),

En Anai Ambalethe, ) (I call to Universal Being)

Yellam Vallan Thanaiye Yethu. (In acceptance of the Omnipotent)

Arut Perum Jothi, Thani Perum Karunai

(Compassionate Divine Light, Omnipresent Divine Light,

Thani Perum Karunai, Arut Perum Jothi,

(Omnipresent Divine Light, Compassionate Divine Light)

Indru varumo, Nalaikke Varumo, Endru Varumo,

(Will it come today, tomorrow or when)

Ariyen En Kove,

(I do not know, my Lord)

Thondru-mala, Vemmayayei Attru

(Devoid of the Illusions, that spring forth from oneself)

Vezhikul, Vezhi kidandu

(To dwell beyond the space and time)

Summa kidakkum Sugam

(the eternal bliss of non-being, non-doing)

Arut Perum Jothi, Thani-perum Karunai

(Compassionate Divine Light, Omnipresent Divine Light)

Thani Perum Karunai, Arut Perum Jothi,

(Omnipresent Divine Light, Compassionate Divine Light)

The Right Livelihood Award Ceremony

While it is not difficult to describe the Awards Ceremony itself, it is hard to put into words the emotions felt by all those in attendance. It was held in the “old” Swedish Parliament chamber. Every seat was taken, with rows specifically assigned to the close associates of the four recipients, combined with a large number of the members of Parliament itself.

And four extraordinary winners - all women (it was remarked repeatedly), though Jagannathan was also among the winners, but could not attend. There was Dr. Monika Hauser of Medica Mondiale, honored for her work against the sexual abuse and rape of women during conflicts and war throughout the world, and her efforts to have wartime rape declared a war crime. Asha Hagi, a great souled one, who in trying to help end the ceaseless and dangerous conflict among the five traditional clans of Somalia, had women declared and recognized as a “sixth clan” regardless of origin and across clan boundaries, and a party to all peace negotiations, as well as founder of Save Somali Women and Children ( www.sswcscom.org, www.ashahagimission.com ). Amy Goodman, independent journalist, blacked out by most major media in the United States, but whose show “Democracy Now” is now broadcast on 750 radio and television stations across the world, and is a beacon of truth-telling for many of us. Both the ceremonies, and interviews with each of the other winners (including Krishnammal) can be heard on her website - www.democracynow.org/2008/12/8/ And then of course Krishnammal herself, both older and shorter than the rest, as she was quick to note at the beginning of her address. She was the last to speak.

There were trumpets, and folk violins, and children doing traditional Swedish folk dances, and an a capella group singing, among other things, songs by Abba. (This is, after all, Sweden.) And there was Krishnammal, beaming for the cameras, (I have a great picture of her with Amy Goodman, and myself, of course). Her address covered true ground, the call for people’s power as the only force that can array itself against military, political, and financial interests, and a call to create a worldwide Army of Compassion. Her son Bhoomi helped prepare a speech for her in advance (as they needed one for the press), and a good one it is (I will post it in another entry); at the event itself, she used not a word of it, but spoke simply and truly from the heart.

Krishnammal’s grandnephew and wife were there from Denmark; Sathya of course; doctor friends from Norway and northern Sweden. Kamran Saedi and Andrew Rigby, long-time friends and supporters, came from England. The buffet dinner following was fabulous (I hardly ate anything). A school choir came in to sing the traditional Santa Lucia (which will actually occur December 13th), with one girl wearing a circle of candles around her head. It was also Eid Ul-Adha, the Muslim holiday celebrating the Abraham’s sacrifice of Ishmael (in the Muslim tradition, it is Ishmael, not Isaac, who is taken up to the mountain.) It is a holiday marking the command of charity and compassion, and we wished all the Muslims, members of Asha Hagi’s party, “Eid Mubarak.” Everyone wanted photos with everyone else! I hope we will have some of them up on the Friends of LAFTI website soon.

Back in the hotel, we all stayed up until 2 A.M. Krishnammal’s normal bedtime is about 9 (she still gets up at 4 A.M. every morning, regardless of where she is), but between Skype on my computer, and cellphones blazing, there were many people to call around the world. And the entire Right Livelihood Foundation team returned to the hotel, and conversations, business card swapping, storytelling about the recipients, and just good fellowship to celebrate, if for but a fleeting moment, the possibilities of peace and justice in the world, went on late into the night.

Eldsjäl

So much happening! Flash forward - we are now in Sweden! Where the sun is setting at 2:45 p.m., and I am so busy, I barely notice!

Some of the Swedes who have accompanied Krishnammal to the engagements we have had in Stockholm surrounding the Right Livelihood Award ceremony have taken to calling her “Eldsjäl”, which means “Fire-Soul”. I have not been able to find the origin of the term, though it seems to have come from the Vikings, meaning one who has been possessed with the fire of the gods.

It is true she has been burning these days, and we have been seared by her heat. Men in suits (myself included, the suit being a rare event), have been reduced to tears or close to it, as she speaks simply of her life growing up in one of those wretched mudhuts with 12 brothers and sisters (six of whom died), and her simple message of the Divine Light within, the need for self-inquiry, and the possibilities of human development. “You cannot purchase human development in any shop,” she quips, and while the desire to eliminate the mud huts of the poor consumes her thinking, she emphasizes that the real revolution is the one that must come from within. “We are more than flesh and bone,” she says, “and we are placed on earth to do more than simply feed the body.” “You are not likely to find it in school either,” she pointedly instructs a group of university students, “but it is a daily struggle to allow yourself to be set free, which often comes with renunciation and suffering,” “I have passed my exam on this earth,” she states in her usual matter-of-fact manner, implying of course that is it now our turn.

Apparently, many of those associated with the Right Livelihood Award have been followed her work (and that of Jagannathan) for a long time. One went so far as to suggest (I have no idea whether this is apocryphal) they were closely considered for the Award in the 1980s, but at the time had been considered “too old”. Now, a member of Parliament, in introducing her, said it was one of the high points of his life (and one he didn’t expect) to meet someone associated with Mahatma Gandhi, and one who had truly carried on his legacy.

I was rather surprised by the number of people who actually seemed to know who I was. Some of it, I think, were the long letters and nomination documents I had been sending them over the years. Others knew the work of New Society Publishers (which I founded), and were pleased to hear it is still going strong.

Wherever we went, we were instantly surrounded, not so much by people asking questions, as by men and women simply coming up and either explicitly or implicitly asking for her blessing.

Eldsjäl indeed.

(You can hear an interview of Krishnammal with Amy Goodman on Democracy Now! (www.democracynow.org/12/8 )

Some photos from the Opus Events

1. (Top) Krishnammal was introduced at the Opus Awards by an extraordinary Seattle University graduate (and our new friend) Tuseef Chaudhry (right). This picture is with his family. At Tuseef's invitation, Ellen and I attended a fine meeting at Seattle's Town Hall on Islam and World Peace.

2. A rare, face-to-face meeting of the Friends of LAFTI Foundation! - from left: Randa Blanding, Peggy Burns (our intrepid Executive Director), you know who, Jenny Ladd, and moi.

3. On stage for the Awards Ceremony. Benaroya Hall was packed with 2,900 people, and we were told there was a waiting list of 800.

4. Jagannathan was with us in spirit. He spun the threads that made the cloth for Aliyah's churi dal (right), and gave it to her when we had gone to help with tsunami relief in 2004.

5. So this was one of the rare times that our entire family was together - Aliyah, Ellen, Meera, and yours truly, and with Krishnammal no less!

6. David Willis came in from Japan. Bhoomikumar from Sweden on the way home to Cambodia. In 31 years since I've known them both (actually, I've known "the other David" for 35) I think this is the first time we've all be in the same place at the same time.

Friends

The following is written by Somik Raha, a Ph.D. student in Decision Analysis and Stanford University, and posted with permission:

In Chapter 6 of the Bhagvad Gita, Krishna tells Arjuna, "O Arjuna, that yogi is considered the best who judges what is happiness and sorrow in all beings by the same standard as he would apply to himself. (32)" Further, in Chapter 14, Krishna expounds the qualities of those who are not deluded by their own nature. Among the many listed, here are a few, "one who is the same under honor and dishonor, who is equally disposed towards the friend and the foe; who has renounced all (selfish) enterprise - this one is said to have gone beyond nature. (25)"

While it is one thing to philosophically parse these words and ponder on its meaning, it is exhilarating to find a living example, without which such ideals would be relegated to the ivory towers of impractical high philosophy.

In this series, I will share stories of living examples, who can still be met by the interested reader with a little effort. But first, let us set up a contrast. We are all too familiar with the jholaawaala brigade that is ready for "andolan" any given time of the day. Such people take up worthy causes and often dedicate their lives to it. When they speak, they usually train their guns on an "enemy" and spew venom. No matter how noble the cause, readers are burned by the vitriol that comes out and are unable to move beyond the venom. The powers that be ridicule such activists and if they ever give in, it is usually out of frustration and irritation, without any sense of compassion or restitution.

The activists themselves have a career that looks like a bell curve. Their ego rises with their career, and after a certain point, they are so consumed by their self-importance that they cannot see beyond themselves and are blind to the good in those they oppose. And so begins their descent, as they get deluded by their own nature. Their co-workers end up parting ways, frustrated and dejected by the ego-centric leadership that manifests itself in many ways in their movement. At the end, we have a lot of angry people - angry at the "enemy," angry with each other, angry with themselves.

And then, right under our noses, we find the exact opposite - people who are terribly active for a cause, but are not consumed by it. Their intellect and intuition are synchronized, each guiding the other. They find divinity in those who others might call the "enemy." The laws of human nature as we know it collapse and we start witnessing changes in attitude of their opponents, some of which might be termed "miracles." Perhaps, Swami Vivekananda's observation that "what goes around comes around" is true after all.

It is time to meet Krishnammal Jagannathan, fondly referred to as Amma. Amma was born in a harijan community and was very rebellious during her childhood years. She remembers that if her brother hit her once, she would hit him back three times. As she grew older, she had the good fortune of meeting Mahatma Gandhi, and remembers being very deeply touched by that meeting. She noticed a young man who was controlling the crowds during that meeting. They met later and the young man was of Brahmin birth. Influenced by Gandhiji, he had determined that he would only marry a Harijan, and as she puts it, "In his eyes, I was that girl." She was not interested in marriage but finally, they both agreed to only get married in free India, which they did.

She completed her university education but did not wait to get her degree, she felt that the certificate was a useless piece of paper, and she would rather prefer service through Sarvodaya (which means "Welfare of All"), a movement started by Gandhiji. She and her husband walked with Vinoba Bhave in the Bhoodaan movement, a walk that should be in history textbooks all over the world. In 1968, 44 Dalit Christians were burned alive by the landlord over a land dispute. Heartbroken, she rushed to the spot and remembers that she couldn't stop crying for three days. She resolved to bring justice to these families. But not in the usual sense of litigation and punishment. Instead, she started a non-violent movement where she would plead with landlords to share their land with the less fortunate landless tillers, in the same style as the Bhoodan movement, under the banner of LAFTI (Land For Tiller's Freedom).

What is unique in her approach is that she believes there is a great light within her and in all beings. She considers the landlords who commit injustice as sick people, those who cannot see their own divine light. The language she uses to describe her encounters with the landlords is comic and tragic at the same time. She recalls, "I went to meet my friend, and he attacked me." A perplexed listener asked her, "Amma, why would a friend attack you?" And she replied, "Oh, the friend was a landlord." Another time, the moment she walked in, the landlord got so enraged that he went inside to find a stick to beat her with. Her response: instead of being angry or upset, she goes to the local temple and decides to pray for her sick friend without food and water. After three days, her friend is unable to take it anymore and comes to the temple to tell her, "Amma, please stop the fast. Let us eat together and we'll discuss this land issue." And invariably, she would get land to redistribute to the landless.

Another time, when she was on her regular morning walk, goons from her landlord friends surrounded her and poured kerosene all around. Her reaction: she sat down calmly and started singing her favorite bhajans, ready to die. This enraged the goons and they started abusing her loudly. The villagers woke up and came to her rescue. On seeing them, her attacker friends ran away.

While she walks through dangerous situations all the time, what makes the retelling so funny is the complete absence of any anger or hatred. Amma believes she lives in a world of friends and her experience confirms her belief. She also is in no hurry - she does not manage by objectives and annual performance. She says that this July (2008), a landlord involved in the massacre of 1968 told her that he was wrong and he wanted to give away his land to Amma for whatever purpose she had in mind. The indefatigable Amma is already making plans - she will start a school for Dalit children to help them come out of their condition.

Her focus has been on the empowerment of Dalit women. She claims to have an "army of women," whom she trains in non-violence. She finds that less people have, the more they have to give. She is often invited home by the women, and she will sleep on their bed, where a pillow is made for her comfort by tying the household clothes together. Lying down in that condition, she cries for these women - how hard they work, how much they sacrifice and how much they are willing to give. And yet, our society engages in exploiting them. She identifies so much with their suffering that their pain is her own. Her material needs are so few and she will be considered penniless for tax purposes, and yet she lives, walks and talks like a queen.

I met her two weeks back at Stanford and then in the Bay Area, before proceeding on to Seattle to receive the Opus Prize (as a finalist). She has also been awarded the 2008 Right Livelihood Award (also known as the Alternate Nobel Prize) in Stockholm. In her funny style, she told us that she tried to find Seattle on the map but was unsuccessful. When she went to the airport, they wouldn't let her board because she didn't know where she would stay in the US. She called up her daughter and finally got an address. Even after arriving, she was unsuccessful in locating Seattle on the map, but believed that she would be taken care of wherever she went, which is true for such human beings."

(Glad she found us!)

Oh, my, where to start?

Krishnammal and Vengopu arrived from San Jose, and I brought them home! For weeks, we had been borrowing cots and blankets and towels from friend, and drew up plans where everyone was to sleep. Not quite Indian railway station, and we knew enough to know that folks might self-organize when they got here.

Krishnammal has always been taken with idea that we have cornsnakes as pets. Just two, birthday presents for Aliyah when she turned six, so the snakes are now 15 years old. Not friendly creatures anymore (for lack of being handled), but they spend all day slithering about the bottom of their terrarium, eat (a defrosted mouse) every couple of weeks, and basically keep to themselves (when they aren’t singing?) So while she had some fear of snakes (I don’t think I’ve ever met an Indian who didn’t), Krishnammal was strongly attached to the idea that we’ve always had lots of animals at our home – dogs, birds, rabbits, snakes, iguanas, rats.

I delighted in cooking for all the guests – sambar (south Indian curry) and rice, ladysfingers (okra!) with mustard seed, rasam (spicy thin peppery soup – everyone agrees my sambar is better than my rasam, though most of it has to do with which package I managed to find at my local Indian foods store. But we did go out and buy an idli (steamed rice and lentil cakes) maker, and they came out good!

Prior to our three days with the Seattle University/Opus Award activities and awards, we had four days of virtually non-stop events for Krishnammal. I’d like to take credit for them – in reality, once I put out the word she was coming, the outpouring of support was extraordinary, and I didn’t have to actually organize even a single event.

Highlights included a talk with folks interested in Indian development issues at Microsoft, an event jointly sponsored by ASHA for Education and the Seattle University Department of Theology and Religious Studies, a reception at the Vedic Cultural Center, in Sammamish, a potluck at my local Friends (Quaker) Meeting (the food was great!), and topped off with 200-person fundraising dinner in Redmond that featured some magnificent bhajans, and a 45-minute bharatnatyam performance based on Krishnammal’s life that moved us all greatly. Amma gave a different speech at every event, with different stories, different details. She told me, “I am like a bird. I don’t prepare for any of them, and sometimes it is surprising even to me what comes out.” To me, they are always too short – I can listen to her stories for hours! (and do)

A special note must be made of Krishnammal’s appearance at a joint fundraiser with Habitat for Humanity. Only two blocks from my home, Habitat is building a “colony”, with some 20 homes for folks, most of whom are working, but who could not otherwise own their own house. My work place, the Health and Rehabilitative Services Administration of the state’s Department of Social and Health Services has adopted a family, a mother (who works as a nursing assistant in the hospice program in which my wife is employed), and her two young children. Krishnammal made mental notes of the houses under construction (she was of course surprised they were so large, until she remembered that for most of the year, people live totally indoors), and spoke movingly of the links between the project here in Olympia, Washingtonand her dream of building decent, weatherproof housing with the poor people of Nagai and Tiruvarur Districts.

Right Livelihood Award!

The BIG NEWS! Krishnammal and Jagannathan and LAFTI have been named winners of this year's Right Livelihood Award (www.rightlivelihood.org ) the "alternative Nobel Prize"! The Award will be presented at the Swedish Parliament in Stockholm on December 8th. And I get to go!!!

The citation reads:

Krishnammal and Sankaralingam Jagannathan, and their organisation LAFTI (Land for the Tillers' Freedom) (India), who receive an Award "for two long lifetimes of work dedicated to realising in practice the Gandhian vision of social justice and sustainable human development, for which they have been referred to as 'India's soul'." Krishnammal and Sankaralingam Jagannathan, and their organisation LAFTI (Land for the Tillers' Freedom) (India), who receive an Award "for two long lifetimes of work dedicated to realising in practice the Gandhian vision of social justice and sustainable human development, for which they have been referred to as 'India's soul'."

This award has been long in the making, as LAFTI was first nominated in 2004. We are all very grateful.

Meanwhile, Krishnammal is safely in the U.S., and has paid visits to Massachusetts, Philadelphia, and today begins a round of interviews in Washington, DC. Then she'll head to see relatives in the Carolinas.

We have an abundance of West Coast events planned - in the San Diego area, Bay area, and Olympia/Seattle, prior to the Opus Prize being presented. Virtually all of them are free. If you'd like to attend one, write Friends of LAFTI at info@friendsoflafti.org

Have I mentioned we have a new website? www.friendsoflafti.org ?

Oh, and anyone who wishes to write me, try shantinik@earthlink.net

david

A Letter to the Resident Indian Community in America

From Amma:

Greater moments in my life…

There have been many great moments in my life, each greater than the next, it seems. I have been blessed to be in the company of Mahatma Gandhi, Acharya Vinoba Bhave, Shri Jeyaprakash Narayan, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, and Mr. and Mrs. Martin Luther King (when they visited our Ashram in Gandhigram in Tamil Nadu, India), to name some of the luminaries who have inspired me to lead a life dedicated to the uplift of the landless poor, particularly women.

It was 1942. Atop the Palani hills, we were assembled for the evening prayer in the presence of Mahatma Gandhi. Surprised by the presence of a young women (I was just out of college), Shri Rajagopalachari, then Governor General of India, asked, "Who is this girl, sitting close to Gandhi?" Dr. Soundaram Ramachandran, my godmother, one of the first women doctors in India and the daughter of TVS Soundaram, the Henry Ford of South India, replied, "She is my daughter!" Following this was the evening prayer in which I sang the lead prayer-song. What could be a greater moment in one's life?

A few days later, at a public meeting in the city of Madurai, I was on the stage with Gandhiji, the huge crowd surging towards us, when I saw a young man trying to manage the crowd that was getting too close to the dais and who in the process was being jostled and pushed. I was not aware then who he was, nor that I would meet him again in Gandhigram, and fate would bring us together. Then, the year was 1950. We had decided to marry only in a free, independent India. The close associates of Gandhiji - Shri Ariyanaygamji, the doyen of basic education; Shri J.C. Kumarrappa, the Gandhian economist; and Shri Ramachandran, the founder of Gandhigram Rural University - were all present as Shri R. Keithan, a practicing Gandhian who left his American church to join Gandhiji in the freedom struggle, solemnized our wedding with a simple garland of handspun yarn. What a memorable occasion! Shri. Jegannathnaji, my would-be life-long partner not only gifted me the wedding-saree, handspun in 48 days on his chakra (spinning wheel), but gave to me a life-path of dedication and suffering that continues to this moment. We both walked with Vinoba Bhave in his long march for 14 years all over India, appealing to landlords to voluntarily donate land for the landless.

Another great moment was when I could distribute one acre each to 10,000 landless families through a peaceful nonviolent transfer from landlords to the landless poor in the Cauvery Delta region, an area where 44 women and children were burnt alive in retaliation to a request for a higher wages on Christmas Eve 1968. Great, too, was the moment when Jegannathanji and I, after three long years of hard work, could relieve the sufferings of women in rural Bihar state from exploitation and bonded slavery, by distributing 24,000 acres of land to them in the august presence of Shri Jeyaprakash Narayan.

There were moments of recognition and rewards. Shri Jegannathan and I were honored with the Jamnalal Bajaj Award (1998) and Bhagwan Mahaveer Award (1996), given by Shri Rajiv Gandhi and Shri C. Subramanium, respectively, for our lifelong commitment to the cause of the landless poor. I was awarded the Padma Shri as well (1989) and both Jegannathan and I were nominated twice for the Right Livelihood Award (2004, 2006), the alternate Nobel Peace Prize. In the year 2005, I was one among a select group of women all over the world who were jointly recommended for the Nobel Peace Prize.

It is equally a great moment to meet you all, either in person, or in cyber space, to share my story and vision for the rural poor in Tamil Nadu. It is a shame that our brothers and sisters in India continue to live in conditions worse than a pigsty, and I am determined to change all that. The greatest reward is to see the divine light shining in the little huts of the poor, and I am happy that you all will give me a helping hand in my mission. I am visiting the U.S. not only to receive an award from the OPUS Foundation but also to bridge the hearts and minds of dedicated young professionals, business-people, and Indian communities in America with the downtrodden women in rural India. Swami Vivekanada came to Chicago to attend the World Congress of Parliament in 1893, and his address to American citizens sowed the seeds of Vedantha in the West. My sons and daughters of America, I am here to meet you all, bringing goodwill and greetings from the women of rural India who toil day and night in the soil to produce food for us all, but still go hungry to bed in mud huts, for whose cause I have lived all my life!

I seek the blessings of Ramalinga Swami, whose Graceful-Divine Light (Arut Perum Jyothi), and Greater Compassion (Thaniperum Karunai) has guided and blessed me all my life, for the well-being of each and every one of you, your family and friends.