The ‘mindless’ Messiah
Society, February 1980
By Shobha Kilachand
Tags such as the one above, don't fit him. Descriptions are always inadequate. Questions are irrelevant, and hence unanswerable. U.G. is nothing and everything. ‘Nothing’ according to himself, ‘everything’ according to his admirers. He's no preacher, no Godman, no mystic, no philosopher. Perhaps he's an enigma, shrouded in mystery, within a secret. All that ‘is’ about U.G. is his existence.
How does one go about interviewing somebody who describes himself as a “unique animal”? That's what U.G. Krishnamurti, the ‘mindless’ messiah calls himself. “U.G.” uttered with such genuine admiration by his friends is not to be confused with his better known namesake J. Krishnamurti. U.G. is little known, but is a firebrand, if we may be allowed to use such a term……and Mr. George Fernandes has no objections. Sixty-two year old and small built, U.G. was born in a small town, Masulipatnam in Andhra Pradesh from where he went on to complete his postgraduation in philosophy from Madras. Soon he was seized by the age-old urge – the ‘Search for Truth’ – and drifted into the Theosophical movement which was sort of fashionable those days for the intelligensia. Consequently he found himself in the West at an early age, and has stayed there since.
The interview took place in the suburban residence of film director Vijay Anand. The door was kept open and when we spoke to Vijay about interviewing his house guest, he said, “Anybody is welcome to walk in here and talk to him.” There wasn't a horde of people thronging around him. In fact, when we arrived, there were only a couple of ‘friends’ other than Vijay Anand, Parveen Babi and a 79-year old Swiss lady who was introduced as U.G.'s caretaker-cum-Godmother. U.G. remarked candidly later, “You can say I live off her.”
U.G. was dressed in a pyjama and a handloom kurta, and his face glowed with the years spent in Switzerland. He wore no chappals, but wore his silver-streaked hair long and well-groomed, almost like a rock star. He sat quietly on the sofa, waiting for our questions. Though, according to him, “All questions are frivolous. There is no serious question, and serious questions get no answers at all because serious questions have no answers.” And so we sort of wondered aloud about him. It was a close encounter of a mystical kind. From time to time U.G. paused and enquired patiently and politely, “Is it clear to you?” Sometimes it was clear as crystal, other times a total blank. Bravely, we kept at it.
U.G. started, his voice ringing out in a clear and commanding tone, “I've no message to give to the world. Whatever happened to me is such that you can't share it with the world. It's an extraordinary experience—like the sunset, or a flower, or a mountain. And I don't like to sit in one place, surrounded by people asking set questions. That's the reason I don't care for a platform or give any lectures. It's not that I can't give lectures, I've lectured everywhere in the world. A lot of my friends in America still press me to go there and give lectures. But I say to them that I've nothing to say. I never initiate any discussions. People come and sit around me. They can do what they like. If somebody asks me a question suddenly, I try to answer, emphasising and pointing out that there is no answer to that question. So I merely rephrase, restructure and throw the same question back at you. It's not game-playing. Because I am not interested in winning you over to my point of view. It's not a question of offering opinions. Of course, I do have my opinions on everything from disease to divinity. But they are as worthless as anybody else's.”
“People call me an enlightened man. I detest that term. They can't find any other word to describe the way I am functioning, At the same time, I point out that there is no such thing as enlightenment at all. I say that because all my life I've searched, and wanted to be an enlightened man. And I discovered that there is no such thing as enlightenment at all. And so the question whether a particular person is enlightened or not doesn't arise. I don't give a hoot for a sixth century B.C. Buddha, let alone all the other claimants we have in our midst. They are a bunch of exploiters, thriving on the gullibility of the people. There is no power outside of man. Man has created God out of fear. So the problem is fear, and not God.”
“I am not a recluse. This is the only world. There is nothing I can do to run away from the world. This is the only reality and there is no other reality at all. I've searched for the Ultimate Reality all my life, and discovered for myself that there is no such thing. What's necessary for man is to free himself from the entire past of mankind, not only individual past. That's to say free yourself from what every man thought, felt and experienced before you. Then only is it possible for you to be yourself. The whole purpose of my talking to people is to point out the uniqueness of every individual. Culture or civilization (or whatever you might call it) has always tried to fit us in a framework. Man is not man at all, I call him a ‘unique animal’. And man will remain a unique animal as long as he's burdened by culture.”
“I'm not interested in changing the society. I am not an ascetic. All I need is clothes, food and shelter. The moment you need more than that you've created a problem for yourself. Once the energy that's used in chasing something that doesn't exist, is released in you, life becomes a very, very simple thing. What I am saying has absolutely no social content at all. What is wrong with this world? Why do you want to change the world? This is an extraordinarily beautiful world. You want to change this world so that you can live in a world of your own ideas. The real problem is that you want to change yourself. And you find it's impossible. And so you want to change the world so that you can fit the world into your own pattern.”
“To me there is no such thing as mind. Mind is a myth. Since there is no such thing as mind, and mind is a myth, the mutation of mind that J. Krishnamurti is talking about has no meaning. There is nothing to be transformed there—radical or otherwise. There is no self to be realized. The whole religious structure that has been built on this foundation collapses because there is nothing there to realize. To me Krishnamurti is playing exactly the same game as all those ugly saints in the market, we have in the world today. I was with Krishnamurti for seven years….”
…I am curious about one thing. Did [Parveen Babi] make any earth-shaking “discoveries” about herself in this difficult period? She regards me steadily, and in a very even voice she says, “Yes, I did. I discovered that nobody was interested in me……….except U.G. Everybody had their own motives. It just proved that nobody is interested in another human being. It's not as if anybody let me down or anything. It's not as dramatic or insensitive as that. But something, that was always apparent, became very, very clear to me. That, during trouble or pain, you are always on your own. U.G. taught me a very important lesson. He said, ‘Life is for living. Don't kill yourself working.’ …I cannot describe the kind of fondness. It's every person's desire to find that one person who cares and can be completely trusted. I consider myself fortunate to have found U.G.”
Parveen's search goes back a long way. Even when she first came into the industry, she was on a different trip, and stood apart from the rest of the giddy-headed, over made-up newcomers. Sure, she seemed vague and in the clouds. …Even so there was a fey curiosity and childlike sense of wonder in her. “I don't know why I was searching, what I was searching for. I was dissatisfied with the world as I saw it. Call it teenage disillusionment. I went to J. Krishnamurthy's lectures. He gave me hope by showing me another reality, another lifestyle. That attracted me……till I met U.G. The first thing that hit me was when he said, there is no other kind of reality, the kind you are looking for. With U.G. my spiritual search came to an end. Now I'm not seeking anything at all. I just want to live. The film industry is not the entire world and the world is not the film industry. I want to be with U.G. as much as I can. …It was U.G.'s energy that cured me.”
