About Us

Purnam is a part of Auroville, the City of Dawn in the making in South India, near Pondicherry.

While entire Auroville is an international campus for karmayoga covering all aspects of the life of the city in the making for 50,000 people, the specific focus of Purnam is on spiritual education based on the ideals of Auroville and sharing it with the wider world.

Spiritual Foundation

Auroville is based on the vision of Sri Aurobindo and the task of giving a concrete form to Sri Aurobindo’s vision was entrusted to his spiritual collaborator the Mother. The creation of a new world, a new humanity, a new society expressing and embodying the new consciousness is the work she has undertaken. By the very nature of things, it is a collective ideal that calls for a collective effort so that it may be realised in the terms of an integral human perfection.

Legal Status

Purnam Community is an initiative of the Purnam Centre for Integrality, a unit of the Auroville Foundation. 

Auroville Foundation is an institution of Higher Education under Ministry of Education, Government of India under UNESCO category. Its legal framework has been laid out in an act of Indian Parliament in 1988 known as Auroville Foundation Act. This act of the Parliament provides Auroville with a special status to embark upon a bold experiment in education unprecedented in the country as well as the world. This makes Auroville radically different from conventional universities or other institutions of higher education.

Vision & Mission of Purnam

The spiritual gift of India to the world

We are inspired by the idea of ‘the spiritual gift of India to the world‘ as envisioned by Sri Aurobindo. In this light our mission is to train 50,000 karmayogis who will carry the spirit of India. 

To realise this vision we are creating a transformative learning community to coach young spiritual seekers to become karmayogis.

The Meaning of Purnam

Purnam is a Sanskrit word that means integral, whole and complete. 

When you live with internal conflicts and confusion, you are getting torn and psychologically fragmented.  Thus you lose your wholeness. Then, you cannot engage with your life or work wholeheartedly. Eventually this internal fragmentation will manifest as outer friction and conflict with the larger whole of which you are a part. This friction and conflict manifests everywhere – within family and personal relationships, within organisation and teams, within society and Nations and within the larger ecosystems of which you are a part. To restore the outer harmony, first, you must restore your inner wholeness. This is the paradigm shift we at Purnam work with. This is the fundamental idea upon which the Purnam Community is built.

Swadharma & Swabhava

There is an inborn purpose, function and way of being for each part in the larger whole of which it is a part. It is the very truth and foundation of its being, its reason for existence. This inborn truth of being and way of being is its Swadharma and Swabahava, it is the key to its unique individuality and evolution towards its own wholeness. This principle of Swadharma and Swabhava is the same for an individual, organisation, community or a Nation and it is the foundation of one’s culture. When you live according to your Swadharma and Swabhava, you will naturally find your wholeness and evolve harmoniously with the larger whole.

Karmayoga

Swabhava niyatam karma – Gita

Work according to one’s natural way of being is the starting point of accelerating one’s spiritual evolution through work. It is the path of your destined work, your life purpose.

Our Address

Purnam Centre for Integrality,
Auroville,
Villupuram,
Tamil Nadu  605101