Editorial: Where Historical Items are a Steal

On March 25, 2004, a report of theft created national waves. It was theft of Rabindranath Tagore’s Nobel medal and a certificate with some 43 other articles from Rabindra Bhavan in Santiniketan. Today when there is news of former Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shashtri’s gold watch having been stolen from Lal Bahadur Shastri Memorial, that sort of shock is not to be seen despite the historical importance of the watch being very high.

Lal Bahadur Shashtri was gifted the watch in Moscow in 1965 by his Russian counterpart Alexei Kosygin. Shashtri gifted it to his son Anil Shashtri, who, in turn, gifted it to Lal Bahadur Shastri Memorial in 2005. Given the honesty the name Lal Bahadur Shashtri stands for in the country, theft of his watch is a national shame, particularly so after country’s museums and memorials and security there has an alert – theft of Tagor’s medal, the thief of which was arrested some four years later, a time in which the case of theft was closed and reopened twice and it was Bangladesh police that tasted the final success.

Given the honesty the name Lal Bahadur Shashtri stands for in the country, theft of his watch is a national shame, particularly so after country’s museums and memorials and security there has an alert – theft of Tagor’s medal, the thief of which was arrested some four years later, a time in which the case of theft was closed and reopened twice.

It was only three days after the theft that the matter was reported to the police following an unsuccessful internal investigation to locate it. On the day of theft, some unidentified persons had spent unusually long time at the museum. The memorial has one guard at the entrance and one at exit and Anil Shashtri has already asked the Central Public Works Department to beef up the security.

The theft indicates that country’s museums and memorials are not well equipped with competent security and scientific gadgetries like cameras. Yes, police have found the fingerprints, but it cannot be of much help until there is something to get hold of the culprit to match the fingerprint with. It also suggests that the administration’s attitude towards the belongings of historical figures is no different than safety and security of public at large, which faces minor incidences like theft very often.

However, in a country where people damage and destroy heritage buildings themselves, the administration can hardly be expected to be on qui vive towards the safety of the belongings of historical figures. Sweden’s Nobel Foundation had offered two replicas of the stolen Nobel medallion of Rabindranath Tagore to Visva Bharati University in 2005, even before the thief was caught. But such replicas would not come our way in every case, for every historical item is not replicable.
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