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Early on in school, Gaurav Marathe embraced a Viraja mantra translated by a teacher: “Humans are like a candle. After the candle burns, carbon stays on it, and you have to remove that black carbon from the light so the light again illuminates.” The mantra taught him to experiment with both removing the carbon and illuminating the jyoti — the light that exists within. In one of many experiments, he challenged students to remove the carbon of a task-driven, rule-driven festival on a campus where he taught. “Let’s do that experiment. Let it be the kind of carnival where nobody is charging anything. No cost price, nothing. If anybody wants to pay, they pay. If they don’t, they don’t. Let’s believe in that spirit.” It was successful beyond anyone’s imagination, and became a “Soul Carnival” where the focus is on giving over profiting. “Perhaps that’s the point of these experiments — not to have all the answers, but to keep creating spaces where we can go close to inner jyoti a little more.”
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