Despite the chaos of the previous day, no one in Auroville thought the situation would deteriorate so quickly. Not even the residents of the Youth Center. When you live in paradise, when you take part in an adventure as peaceful as Auroville, you don’t expect to be surrounded by two hundred police officers in the middle of the night, much less to see them protecting bulldozers.

Yet there had been warning signs before the shock of the previous day—tremors hinting at the coming earthquake. A few days earlier, the bulldozers were nothing more than chimeras, grey shadows in the atrophied minds of a few, scraps of paper in the form of threatening letters its new administration, which was already showing a pronounced disregard for the Auroville regulations. “Collaborate or be destroyed,” they warned. “If you’re not with us, you’re against the government.” Harsh words. Threats. “We will build a road whether you like it or not.” But no one believed it. Auroville is accustomed to the ephemeral demands of bureaucrats, and no one would be foolish enough to build a road without first buying all the land to complete it. They did not fully grasp the nature of the antagonists in this story and their masters.

To put yourself in the shoes of the inhabitants, imagine you are eighteen years old. You live in one of the many houses built in the trees. Your bedroom soars nearly ten meters above the ground, and it is to the song of birds that you wake every morning. You’ve spent the day reimagining the world with friends, preparing pizzas in the wood-fired oven for “Pizza Night,” and taking part in one of the center’s activities with friends from all corners of India and the world. The common language is English, intermingled with Tamil and whatever else you can imagine—because that doesn’t really matter. You live in a place without rent, free from the monthly pressures of the “modern” world. You have time to read Indian philosophers and manga, to work on yourself and for others. After that eventful Saturday, you still feel light-hearted. The residents demanded an end to the massacre, and it would never occur to you that anyone could dare to ignore that demand. You’d be mistaken.

You are suddenly awakened by the sound of machines. It’s just past midnight. The crickets have fallen silent. You open your eyes because of flashing lights tearing through the night and screams coming from the forest. You carefully descend from your nest, trying to discern the source of the tumult, using your phone as a flashlight. A friend calls out to you, panic in his eyes:

“Bulldozers are back. They’re coming. No one can get through. The police have blocked all access points. We must do something.”

Shocked, you join a gathering near the source of the chaos. About fifteen other young people are on their phones, calling for help. And in the distance, you hear the sound of falling trees, cracking branches, the forest collapsing before the harsh lights of the bulldozers.

Panic-stricken, you search for your own phone. You call friends, family—anyone who might come to your aid.

Finally, the message gets out. Children reach out to a few sleepless parents. The parents wake their neighbors, and dozens of people rush out into the darkness to join you, only to be quickly intercepted by an obscene number of police officers. They encircle the area, demand passports and visas, shining their torches into the faces of the intruders. Such a display of force is unprecedented in Auroville.

A few courageous ones defy the barricades, weaving through the darkened trees, hoping not to disturb a snake’s nest or a herd of wild boars. They eventually manage to join you, to confront the bulldozers, to stand by your side. The atmosphere grows tense. Adults demand explanations while searching for their children amid the turmoil. They are harshly rebuked. Some young people resist and are hauled off into cars. Others intervene, freeing them. The tension mounts. And meanwhile, the trees keep falling, one after the other, each minute erasing years of reforestation efforts.

The JCBs finally arrive in front of the Youth Center buildings. They have slowly fragmented the forest to reach their goal. Now, they intend to destroy the buildings—right there, in the middle of the night. Fortunately, a sizeable crowd now stands in opposition to the machines, halting the mechanical shovels before they demolish an inhabited building. Tragedy was imminent.

Since that day, the Aurovilians have learned at their own expense that the methods of the new administration disregard rules and truth. They operate by the principle of the fait accompli. What is destroyed is destroyed—move on or file a complaint if you can. That night, enough residents overcame their fear and managed to stop the massacre. It would be one of the first and last times.

It only took a few hours. When the sun finally rose, a corridor had ripped through the forest for a good hundred meters. The bulldozers returned to rest while the inhabitants tried to comprehend what had just happened, preparing coffee. They needed to imagine what would come next. Yet at that moment, no one still believed in the impending disaster. No one dared name the beast. No one dared say, “They will kill Auroville.”

How could they? The “brain fever” – those persistently singing birds – herald the coming day. A few mongooses wander between fallen trunks. Depending on where you look, nothing appears lost. Not yet. And yet, bombs did indeed fall. They didn’t kill anyone; they merely sabotaged the dream of building the city “that the earth needs.” It was the second bombing. There will be many more.

That morning, the pizza oven was still standing. So was the playroom. The threats of deportation were not even yet a chimera.

But the self-proclaimed masters had launched their first attacks. They were searching for their bearings. They will find them soon