Blue Plaque unveiled at SBHG property

The political and spiritual leader, Sri Aurobindo (1872-1950) was commemorated with an English Heritage Blue Plaque at 49 St Stephen's Avenue, W12, a Shepherds Bush Housing Group property, in the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham.

At this address, at the age of fourteen, Aurobindo experienced the first flush of a political awakening, and a sense of injustice at the British rule of India. He went on to become an important figure in India, and laid the foundations for the struggle for independence that was later taken up by Gandhi, among others.

Since Aurobindo's death the worldwide reach and influence of his writings - especially The Life Divine (1939-40) - have grown significantly, he has been the subject of several biographies, and numerous critical studies of his work. His philosophy has been described as a fusion of eastern and western thought.

The unveiling was attended by Paul Doe, Group Chief Executive, Mohammed Najm-Zadeh, Neighbourhood Officer for W12, the English Heritage and numerous supporters and followers of Sri Aurobindo's work.

Sri Aurobindo was born in Calcutta in August 1872. Educated in England, he attended St Paul's School - where he won a number of literary prizes - and secured an open scholarship to King's College, Cambridge where he took a first in the first part of the Classical Tripos. In 1893 Aurobindo returned to India to take up a post in the service of the Maharaja of Baroda and became increasingly involved in politics from 1906.

Aurobindo arrived in the French enclave of Pondicherry in April 1910, where he was to remain for the rest of his life, as the focus of a small community or ashram. During these years, he worked on his own system of yoga, and wrote prolifically. His philosophical and spiritual works included The Life Divine (1939-40), The Synthesis of Yoga (1948), The Human Cycle (1949), The Ideal of Human Unity (1950), and Savitri (1950-51), the longest epic poem in the English language.

In the last two years of his life, Aurobindo received a number of awards, including the Asiatic Society Medal for Peace and Culture. He was also nominated for the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1950, shortly before his death the same year.