Bringing home what belongs here

Vandana Aggarwal

One thing led to the other. A keen history buff, Vijay Kumar started a blog, Poetry in Stone, with the purpose of creating a dummies guide of temple art for the uninitiated. He hoped people would admire and appreciate the beauty of the temple artefacts. In the process, he noticed that several statues that he wrote about were missing. There was ample information about these on the net, but these weren’t traceable. 

He also observed increase in the number of Indian art that was put up for auctions and sale overseas. It didn’t take long for him to connect the dots. One thing, thus, led to the other!

Realising the gravity of the malpractice — that it would rob India of its priceless antiques — Kumar co-founded The India Pride Project (IPP). A voluntary organisation, it provides a platform to volunteers to read, research and record information about the antique statues in temples. The IPP has the largest archive of distributed Indian art in the world. It is maintained by over a thousand volunteers, who work hand in hand with the national task force to produce evidence to bring back the stolen, exported and illegally sold idols. 

Vijay, 44, made headlines after he worked closely with authorities to build a case against Subhash Kapoor, a well-known New York-based art dealer, who had been running a smuggling racket for decades. Kapoor was arrested and extradited to India. Raids revealed that Kapoor had an art inventory worth over $100 million in his warehouses. In his book The Idol Thief, Vijay gives details of the smugglers’ modus operandi.

A Singapore-based finance and shipping expert by profession, he has been instrumental in tracking down important antiquities. One of these, a Kushan-era Buddha, is now on display at the National Museum of New Delhi. It was returned by the National Gallery of Australia. Another one, Tengupura Durga,  that dates back to the 10th century was returned to India by Germany in 2015.

What started off as a hobby has become a war against the pillaging of temples. The main problem, according to him, is that people do not realise the implication of art theft. He rues the lack of attention to the growing problem. “A network of Indian middlemen aided by apathetic government officials facilitates the theft of idols. These are then replaced with replicas and shipped overseas. They take advantage of the lax verification process and proper provenance,” informs Vijay. 

As everything comes at a cost, pinning down smugglers too has a price attached.  “There is a danger of lawsuits and charges of libel. People at high positions, who get benefitted by smugglers and dealers, have access to big-ticket lawyers. We have to back up everything we say in media or courts with facts,” he says.

Thanks to his efforts, museums are finally waking up to the reality that they can be conned into paying top dollar for fake antiques or those acquired illegally.

In tune with the latest happening in the world of antiques, he questions the gift — Nataraj and an Ardhanarishvara — that Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott gave to Indian counterpart Narendra Modi ‘as a gesture of goodwill’. “They can’t gift us what belongs to us. These idols were unfairly taken away. The correct word is ‘restitution’.” He holds the same opinion about the announcement made by the US that it would return 200 idols to India.  However, for now, he is glad that people are sitting up and taking notice of the thefts and doing something to stop these.