A year after some Mahatma Gandhi memorabilia were auctioned for large sums of money and the dust of controversy surrounding this settled, the Government of India has, in a draft policy, outlined its position on the future acquisition of personal objects of iconic national leaders. It has proposed to stay away from any auction of memorabilia, thus refusing to aid in any way their commercial exploitation. This change of stance makes good sense. Personal objects associated with the towering figures of the Indian freedom struggle do have emotional and symbolic value. But the question is: should the state get involved in buying all of them? Institutions such as the Gandhi Smarak Sangrahalaya Samiti, which runs the National Gandhi Museum, are committed to preserving the memory of leaders by acquiring and exhibiting their personal objects. Instead of getting directly involved in obtaining memorabilia, the state can limit its role to extending financial support to such institutions. What is of concern is that the draft policy, after advocating a hands-off approach, appears to dilute its stand by proposing a series of ad hoc measures that will enable the government to actively define the landscape of memorabilia.
The proposal is to direct institutions such as Gandhi Smriti and Darshan Samiti, the autonomous body chaired by the Prime Minister whose mission is to propagate Gandhian thoughts and prepare an inventory of important personal objects of iconic Indian leaders. After amending the Antiquities and Art Treasures Act (1972), the government will designate select objects from this list as art treasures. This, it hopes, will bring in the fear of “severe legal consequence” and deter auctioning of memorabilia, including those legitimately possessed by the owners. Tinkering with an outdated Act, enacted for a completely different purpose, to include memorabilia of every kind cannot be regarded as conceptually sound. What is required is a thorough overhauling of the Act and a tightly reasoned, operational definition of national treasure that can be applied objectively. In this context, a critical study of the Waverley Criteria, adopted by the United Kingdom to identify nationally important cultural objects, should help. The entire process must be guided by a clear-sighted and comprehensible policy that establishes the priorities of the government with respect to cultural objects. Simultaneously, museum infrastructure, which is mostly in a poor state, must be revamped and contemporised, learning from the inspiring experiences of countries like the U.K.
