Treasure trove of antiques
BANGALORE: A villager who went to attend nature’s call early on Tuesday morning, stumbled upon 40 ancient idols in a lake at Amruthahalli.As the water level in the lake had gone down, the heads of the idols were exposed while the villager was squatting nearby to answer nature's call.He tried to assemble them on the banks. Some villagers gathered around him and later informed the police.Amruthahalli police have seized the idols and sent them for archeological studies to estimate their value and age.Police said that the idols of Gods and Goddesses like Ganesha, Vishnu, Saraswati and Christ were found immersed in one part of the lake.It looks as though the idols were stolen from a different city and in the fear of getting trapped, the thieves had hidden them in the lake for the time being, police said.The idols are said to be made of panchaloha (five metals) and are suspected to have great antique value.Amruthahalli police have registered a case and have started investigations.
" Idols worth Rs 1 cr recovered, five arrested"
TNN 30 September 2009, 05:06am IST
Suburban police arrested four members of a gang for illegally possessing old idols of gods and goddesses and trying to sell them at fancy prices.
Acting on a tip-off, deputy commissioner of police (Central Crime Branch) Jaya Kumar and his team raided the house of Uma Maheswari (39). They picked her up along with Bhupendran alias Bhoopathy, Arangulavan alias Hari and Thiruselvam. Idols of Vinayaga, Muruga, Theivanai, Siva and Parvathi valued at more than Rs one crore were recovered.
According to police, the gang members were hoodwinking potential buyers and antique collectors, quoting Rs 24 lakh for each idol and convinced them that the original price was Rs 50 lakh.
At a press conference on Tuesday, suburban police commissioner S R Jangid said that it was yet to be established whether the idols were antiques and that they were being sent to the archeological department for confirmation.
Maheswari, police pointed out, was an agent who supplied extras' to the film industry; Arangulavan was an actor on the small screen; and Bhupdendran and Thiruselvam hailed from Kodungaiyur.
Based on the information provided by Maheswari, the team raided the house of Vijaya Murugan alias Viji in Vellore and recovered 20 more idols and ancient lamps. Murugan posed as a journalist and the state organiser of an all-Indian human rights organisation.
With concerns growing over the smuggling of Indian artefacts, many of them stolen from archaeological sites and unguarded temples, the National Mission on Monuments and Antiquities (NMMA) has stepped up pace on a Rs 90-crore project to document the country's vast trove of ancient idols and sculptures.
Two years after the NMMA was constituted, a template is finally ready for collating data on locations, drawings, photographs, satellite imagery and aerial photography of protected monuments and antiques as well as ancient treasures in unprotected areas.
ask Force recovers ancient conch, antique idols
HYDERABAD: An antique conch dating back to the 18th century AD belonging to a Buddhist monastery situated on the Himalayas and nine idols of various Gods that were stolen from an ancient temple in Karimnagar recently were recovered by the Task Force in separate cases.The conch, according to archeological experts, is a very rare piece and could fetch more than Rs six crore in the international market.East Zone Task Force sleuths laid a trap and nabbed two persons, G Jaideep, who runs a ‘Sharanya gems and jewellery’ store at Eluru in West Godavari district and Mohammed Abdul Ghani alias Baba, an auto-trolley driver from Tappachabutra, while they were trying to sell the conch to a businessman at Malakpet.Police said the conch might had been used during rituals in a Buddhist monastery around 150-years ago in approximately 18th century AD.The conch is about 32 inches in length and its width is about 12 inches. The shell weighs about 8 kg and is studded with silver and semiprecious stones.The spiral top position of the conch has a four-spire covered with silver and has designs of a ram, boar, rabbit, peacock, rat dragon and a demon symbol embedded.The body conch is covered with silver at the opening side and decorated with a ‘Dharma Chakara’ on a pedestal planked by the dragons and an eagle embedded on top of it.The conch has symbols of a horse, pigs, ram, bull and rabbits embedded in silver with flowers.Decorated with floral and geographical designs, the central portion of the conch is decorated with symbols of fire, fish and semiprecious stones. The handle patron also has a dragon figure.“Archeological experts said the piece is very rare and would cost Rs six crore in the international market,” Additional Deputy Commissioner of Police (Task Force) M Ravindranath Babu said.Jaideep reportedly purchased four antique conches from an unknown person in Delhi for Rs 70,000 - Rs 90,000 to sell them at a higher price. He sold one conch for Rs one lakh in Delhi.Another two were sold to Rahmatullah alias Babu, a resident of Khairathabad for Rs 2.10 lakh. Rahmatullah was, however, caught in July 2009 at Punjagutta trying to dispose off the conches.Facing financial problems, Jaideep decided to sell the remaining conch and contacted his friend, Mohammed Abdul Ghani.The duo came near SBI colony at Malakpet for selling the conch to a businessman for Rs 40 lakh when the Task Force nabbed them.They were handed over to the Malakpet police for further action.Meanwhile, South Zone Task Force sleuths along with the Karimnagar police nabbed a scrap businessman from Chandrayangutta, Abdul Rahman, and recovered nine antique idols of different gods from him.Abdul Rahman allegedly stole the nine antique idols from a temple at Shanigaram village in Karimnagar four days back. He was nabbed at Bandlaguda while trying to dispose the stolen idols.
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