Belongings of Mahatma Gandhi, which includes a pair of his iconic glasses, have now been auctioned off. The buyer of this iconic pair glasses is Vijay Mallya, India's liquor and airline baron.
Vijay Mallya bought Gandhijis belongings at $1.8 million. In INR this amount is approximately Rs 9 crore.
Tony Bedi, Mallya’s representative, bid for Bapu’s items. The items of Father of India went under the hammer amid last minute high drama. James Otis, person who owned the items, told that he wanted to call off the auction, but the auction house Antiquorum went ahead with the auction as it was planned earlier.
Indian officials maintained, even prior to the auction, that it was illegal to auction these items of Gandhiji, but also that they were continuing to negotiate with the owner, James Otis, over a possible resolution.
Finally, the government and Otis were not successful in halting the auction. The bidders were roughly a dozen people in the room, 30 of them on the telephone, and about two dozen people who submitted written bids.
Antiquorum told to the media that it would keep possession of the items for at least 2 weeks with them to make sure that there were no legal claims over ownership.
The 2nd highest bid was a $1.75 million bid, which was submitted online from Britain. As soon as Lot Number 364 that is the Gandhi items, came up for sale just after 3 pm, a hush settled across the room and a slide show of Mahatma Gandhi was displayed, with a recording of piano music as background music.
Labels: Antiquorum, India, James Otis, Kingfisher, Mahatma Gandhi, Vijay Mallya
March 06, 2009 | 0
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