8 years on, heritage furniture gathers dust at police station

Chairs designed by Le Corbusier, which were stolen in January 2016 from the Government College of Art, Sector 10, and recovered after a few days, have been lying at the Sector 3 police station, while the college authorities have not made any effort to get these back. Recently, the UT Administration took up the issue of smuggling and illegal sale or auction of the city’s heritage furniture with a French delegation and both decided to form a Joint Action Committee.

According to art collectors, each chair can fetch Rs 5- Rs 10 lakh in international market. Smuggled heritage items, especially furniture designed by Le Corbusier and Pierre Jeanneret, have been sold for lakhs at auctions in foreign countries in the past few years.

As many as 15 sofa chairs and a table were stolen from the storeroom of the college on the night of January 18 in 2016. Fifteen days after the incident, 10 chairs were recovered and two thieves were arrested. A few days later, the remaining five chairs were also recovered.

“The stolen furniture is in our custody. The college authorities have to only approach the local court to get it back. But as of now, we have not received any such request from the college authorities,” said a police official. Commenting on the issue, Director, Higher Education (UT), Rubinderjit Brar said since the issue had come to his notice now, an appropriate action would be taken and responsibility fixed. College Principal Alka Jain was unavailable to speak on the matter.

Ajay Jagga, a lawyer and member of the Chandigarh Administration’s Heritage Items Protection Cell, who has been advocating for the preservation of the city’s heritage, said a standard operating procedure (SOP) should be adopted to deal with such issues. “It is saddening to know that while we have been striving hard to conserve our heritage and taking up the issue with the Central Government and foreign counterparts, stolen heritage furniture items are not being claimed back by the institution that these belong to.”

A few months ago, two heritage chairs from Chandigarh were auctioned for over $10,000 in the US.