NEW DELHI: About 700 pieces belonging to the Aural Stein Collection of Central Asian antiquities owned by the Archeological Survey of India (ASI) were lent to Victoria and Albert Museum in London about 100 years ago.
The artefacts are still lying with the borrower in the United Kingdom and the ASI has not made single effort to get hold of the noted assortment dating between 200 BC and 1200 AD despite the issue being flagged by the CAG in its two previous audit reports in 2013 and 2022.
Non-action of the ASI has apparently upset the Committee of Parliamentarians.
Taking note of the position of the national watchdog of national monuments, the 31-member parliamentary standing committee on transport, tourism and culture has recently asked the ASI to establish contact with the London Museum and set off the process of repatriating the collection.
Stein, a British-Hungarian archaeologist, collected a large number of artefacts -- Chinese, Tibetan and Tangut manuscripts, paintings, Buddhist sculptures, textile fragments, and ceramic objects during his archaeological expeditions to Central Asia at the beginning of the 20th century.
A part of Stein's collection consisting of nearly 600 textile fragments and over 70 ceramic and Buddhist objects was loaned to the museum by the Indian Government through ASI between 1923 and 1933.
The Committee in its recent report titled “Heritage Theft – the illegal trade in Indian antiquities and the challenges of retrieving and safeguarding our tangible cultural heritage—has also expressed dissatisfaction over the response of the Culture ministry.
The ministry stated that ‘there was no record or document in the National Museum regarding the loan of the 700 objects of the Aural Stein collection to the museum’ since it was taken away before Independence. The ministry additionally submitted the Temporary Export Permit (TEP) rule didn’t for the same reason.
“The Committee is well aware that since the objects of the collection were taken out of the country prior to independence, the TEP did not apply to them…as per records these antiquities were still ‘owned by the ASI’ and were on loan but there was no evidence of any efforts of ASI to retrieve them…It is noted that the ASI has not even taken the basic steps to try and ascertain the background in which these objects were loaned to the museum and make efforts for their retrieval,” read the report.
TEP authorises the Central Government of any authority or agency authorised by the Government to temporarily export any antiquity or art treasure for a certain period.
The Committee highlighted in its report that the website of the Museum in London acknowledges that the antiquities are ‘on loan from the Government of India’.
The Panel has further recommended that the ministry and ASI make efforts to find out other cultural objects loaned to foreign museums or collections before the independence or 1972 and initiate action for their retrieval.