NEW DELHI: The Netherlands on Friday formally returned the 11th-century Anaimangalam Chola Copper Plates to India, marking the culmination of a 14-year diplomatic effort to reclaim one of the most important surviving records of the Chola Empire and a prized symbol of Tamil heritage held overseas.
The handover took place in The Hague in the presence of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Dutch counterpart, Rob Jetten.
"A joyous moment for every Indian! Chola Copper Plates dating back to the 11th Century will be repatriated to India from the Netherlands," Modi said in a social media post after attending the restitution ceremony.
Known in Europe for centuries as the Leiden Plates, the artefacts date to the reign of Emperor Rajaraja Chola I, the builder of the Brihadeeswara Temple at Thanjavur and among the most powerful rulers in South Asian history.
The 21 copper plates, weighing nearly 30 kg and bound together by a bronze ring bearing the royal Chola seal, are more than royal records. They preserve the memory of a maritime empire deeply connected to trade, diplomacy and religion across the Indian Ocean.
One section of the plates, inscribed in Sanskrit, traces the genealogy and divine lineage of the Chola dynasty.
The Tamil section records a striking act of medieval religious pluralism and international engagement: Rajaraja Chola I granting revenues from villages near Anaimangalam to support a Buddhist vihara in Nagapattinam built by the Srivijaya kingdom of Southeast Asia.
The inscription offers a rare glimpse into a cosmopolitan world where commerce, faith and political alliances travelled together along monsoon sea routes. A Shaivite emperor patronising a Buddhist institution established by a foreign ruler reflects the Chola Empire’s maritime reach and cultural confidence.
The plates also carry the imprint of two generations of Chola power. While the original grant was issued orally by Rajaraja Chola I and initially recorded on palm leaves, it was his son and successor, Rajendra Chola I, who ordered the decree to be engraved on copper for permanence. The bronze seal fastening the plates bears Rajendra’s emblem.
Historians believe the plates reached the Netherlands around 1700 through Florentius Camper, linked to a Christian mission during the period of Dutch control over Nagapattinam. By then, the Dutch East India Company had made the port city its headquarters on the Coromandel Coast. The artefacts later entered the collections of Leiden University, where they remained for more than three centuries, preserved in vaults and studied by historians and epigraphists, but rarely seen by the public.
Beyond scholarship, the plates occupy a powerful place in Tamil cultural memory. They are referenced in Kalki Krishnamurthy’s celebrated historical novel Ponniyin Selvan, which helped revive popular imagination around the Chola era and its maritime grandeur.
Officials said India began formally pursuing the return of the plates in 2012. The effort gained momentum in 2023 when India raised the issue before UNESCO’s Intergovernmental Committee for Promoting the Return of Cultural Property.
The committee recognised India’s claim and encouraged bilateral discussions with the Netherlands, paving the way for Friday’s restitution. The return of the Anaimangalam Plates is seen as the homecoming of a fragment of India’s civilisational memory.
