‘Meeting UG is my death wish’
Mid Day, In Retrospect, January 3, 1992
By Frank Noronha
UG Krishnamurti, a philosopher of sorts, has been a newsmaker of sorts too. The image of film actress Parveen Babi and film director Mahesh Bhatt comes to their mind who have cared to note his name in the media. It may be news to many that former Prime Minister Chandra Shekhar, during one of his election jaunts, met the philosopher when he was in Bangalore. UG is reported to have described the former Premier as a tough cookie and a no-nonsense chap. UG is now in Delhi. Frank Noronha, a self-confessed UG “freak” describes here what UG means to him.
Our relationships are a means of pleasure and pain. From cradle to grave we spend our time looking for some kind of permanent pleasure. It was during one of those pleasure-seeking adventures that I happened to meet a man called UG Krishnamurti, twenty years ago. Since then he has become my pulse and my beat. I owe everything to him. I love to talk about him to anyone who cares to listen. I have thus become a bore to some, an intellectual to others and a source of irritation to still others. I have also acquired a long list of labels after me – UG-slave, madman, hero worshiper, brainwashed fellow and an intellectual.
But every time I try to sing the song of UG I find a note missing. When someone asks me, “Who is UG and what does he say?” I blurt out something which I know is not correct representation of this unique man. On the other hand, I am afraid, that I misrepresent the man more. But I take refuge into what UG once said to someone who wanted his opinion on a book he was going to write on him.
“What I have stumbled into is something that cannot be shared with anybody. It has no copyright. You are free to reproduce, distribute, interpret, misinterpret, distort, garble, do what you like, even claim authorship without my consent or the permission of anybody.” The words uttered by UG belong to everybody. It is like a river. You can drink it, pollute it, wash your clothes or bulls or throw dead bodies in it, do anything you like.
My little daughter, Sneha, had an extraordinary experience one day which she shared with everybody around her. She had seen two pigeon's eggs in a little nest on the terrace of my house. The child jumped with joy on seeing something that she had never seen before. She called out to everyone around her to share her new excitement. UG Krishnamurti, who happened to be there, said, “Your godmen and religious teachers are no different from your little child. They call out to everyone and say come ye all and listen to me to share some petty little experience of their own with the world.”
It was Emerson who said that if you want your neighbour to believe in god, show him what your god has made you look like. By this standard I am sure I will not inspire any curiosity in anyone to meet this unparalleled person. In fact, my daughter had something concrete – pigeon's eggs – to show to all of us. I do not have anything that will make people come to UG. All that I can do is say, “Go and meet this man for whatever it is worth. Try your luck. Maybe something or nothing may happen to you.”
We have a compulsion to label everything that we perceive. We feel uncertain and challenged if we cannot figure out that which crosses our minds. To avoid this uncertainty and to feel a sense of having conquered something, we beat a hasty retreat to our habit of labeling things. But it tells more about ourselves than what is told upon. “It is a reflection of your intelligence to call me a godman when I say god is irrelevant and redundant,” said UG when I was insisting that I could understand him. It is with the same spirit that many labels have been stuck on UG. To name a few sensational ones – godman, sex-guru of the film world, Mahesh Bhatt's mentor, Parveen Babi's destroyer, a hoax, a fraud and other fancy titles.
But to subject UG to the limitations of our habit of naming everything is to project ourselves and miss this unique person. It is like spitting in the sky. It will only fall on you. If you want sunshine you cannot remain indoors. Similarly, if you want to meet this person you must go without any of your old habits and prejudices.
At the age of 49 UG stumbled into something which shattered everything he had known about himself. This experience was something like an earthquake which freed him from the stranglehold of the machination of thought, blasting every cell, every nerve and every gland of his body. He says, “Everything that every man ever said, felt, thought or experienced, the whole heritage of mankind was thrown out of my system.” What remained is the simple functioning of the physical body – its pulse, its beat and its throb. What sustains him now is life itself. The artificial dams that we build around ourselves to control the river of life has been washed out in UG. UG is like the flowing river. But to write or to talk about your experiences you have to relive again what has already been gone through. But you cannot do this with UG. Our experiencing-structures cannot hold him, contain him and give expression to him. On the other hand he is a threat to everything that we know about ourselves. I have a feeling that my wanting to meet UG every time is a kind of death wish. To avoid being maimed or destroyed completely it is better to stick a label on him, howsoever lacking, and then feel “Yes I know this man.”
All elements of nature meet in UG. He is like the sun that provides warmth. He is like the storm in which you can be swept off. He is like an earthquake that can uproot you. He is like the rain that waters the soil in you. He can also be like the cool breeze after the sweltering heat of living. UG in himself is like a rare flower who can be victim of a farmer's sickle. Naturally, the doubt comes to your mind, “Does a man like UG exist?”
When I had known UG twenty years ago he was a small flame in the far hills. Some years later he started burning brighter – he came to be known here and there. Books were written on him. There were television and radio talk shows of UG in some parts of the globe. The way now the UG-flame is spreading, it seems it is going to engulf the world soon. Mankind will not be able to ignore this man.
But a man is remembered for his achievements. “What are UG's?” One may ask. None whatsoever. He has written no classic literature. He has not built a romantic monument. He has not discovered a scientific principle. On the other hand he has turned his back on the whole of the culture that we have created. What can such a man leave behind? Perhaps he would leave behind individuals who would have a sparkle of their own.
Perhaps, a sense of deep fulfillment of living a life of your own will be felt by those who come in contact with him. Nothing much to brag about by the standards of society. He is like a vast canvas on which you can paint yourself. The design, the shape, the structure that appears on the canvas are your own.
