One by one, Chandigarh losing its heritage items on PU watch

Chandigarh, April 27

While frantic efforts are being made by the UT Heritage Items Protection Cell to thwart auction of city’s legacy furniture for lakhs of rupees on foreign shores, pilferage of prized articles continues quietly right under the nose of authorities back home.

In a latest incident reported on April 25, an unidentified miscreant stole a heritage furniture item from a Panjab University (PU) laboratory.

The police say the suspect entered the laboratory of the Anthropology Department while MSc students were busy with their academic work.

The suspect casually walked into the laboratory and asked a student for a heritage stool. He picked one up and escaped on a motorcycle parked outside the department. The PU security was alerted and the police were also informed about the theft.

Department chairperson Maninder Kaur lodged a complaint with the police following which a case under Section 380 of the Indian Penal Code was registered at the Sector 11 police station. An investigation is underway.

DSP (Central) Gurmukh Singh says the footage of cameras installed at the exit points of the university have been scrutinised, but no motorcyclist has been seen ferrying a stool. “The suspect must have either smuggled it out in a vehicle or may have stashed it away on the campus itself,” says the DSP.

While a suspected motorcycle is seen in the CCTV footage, its registration number is not visible, say sources.

This is not the first case of a heritage item being stolen from the university. Ajay Jagga, a member of the Heritage Items Protection Cell of Chandigarh Administration, has been raising concern over lack of stringent action against those involved in smuggling of heritage articles from the city.

A PU employee was indicted in a probe conducted by a former District and Sessions Judge in a case of heritage theft. Jagga had written to the UT DGP for registration of an FIR against the employee.

The PU Syndicate recently approved demotion and imposition of a major penalty on the employee, Niraj Kumar, who was found guilty of smuggling out a heritage furniture table designed by Pierre Jeanneret and Le Corbusier of the campus.

The case dates back to May 2019 when a security guard had caught a rickshaw-puller taking heritage furniture stolen from the hostel out of the campus without permission. The rickshaw-puller had told the guard Kumar had asked him to take the table to a carpenter in Maloya.

48 chairs nicked from Sociology Dept in 2020

• In Nov 2020, the UT police arrested a carpenter in Baltana, Zirakpur, for his alleged involvement in the theft of 48 heritage chairs from Sociology Department of Panjab University
• He took the chairs from thieves, who gave him the task of delivering these at Delhi and Mumbai. As many as 20 chairs were recovered by the police

Articles worth Rs 4.16 cr sold this year

• Rs 1.64 cr 9 heritage items go under hammer in US
• Rs 1.38 cr 9 articles auctioned in France on Feb 23
• Rs 1.14 cr 9 UT items auctioned off in US on Jan 20

Fetched Rs 2L apiece recently

• Heritage furniture ranging from desks, chairs, stools and study tables have been stolen from PU in the past
• In a recent auction, a set of three stools from PU was sold for around Rs 6L, each item fetching nearly Rs 2L

Varsity depts happy hunting ground for criminals

In past, heritage furniture from PU depts, including anthropology, zoology & geology, have been taken abroad illegally and sold in auctions. — Ajay Jagga, member, UT Heritage Protection Cell