By day, Arvind Venkatraman works as a software engineer in India\u2019s tech hub Chennai. But in his spare time, he is an international art detective whose efforts have helped bring back some of his country\u2019s most valuable antiquities.<\/p>\n
\nVenkatraman is part of a group of art enthusiasts known as the India Pride Project (IPP) who are using Facebook and other social media to identify religious artefacts stolen from temples around the country and secure their return.<\/p>\n
Art theft is big business all over India. But the richest pickings are in Venkatraman\u2019s home state of Tamil Nadu, where centuries-old religious artefacts with huge potential sale values in the West lie largely unprotected in out-of-the-way rural temples.<\/p>\n
Two years ago, the IPP claimed a significant victory when the National Gallery of Australia returned a $5 million bronze statue of the Hindu god Shiva that had been stolen from a Tamil Nadu temple.<\/p>\n
At first Venkatraman says the gallery, which is now suing the Manhattan dealership that sold it the statue, was reluctant to entertain the idea that its purchase was stolen.<\/p>\n
So the IPP organised a social media campaign using images comparing the stolen idol with the one on display at the museum.<\/p>\n
\u201cInitially typically there is a denial,\u201d he told AFP in Chennai.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhether it\u2019s Australia, Europe, Singapore or the US, initially there will be resistance from the museum curators… because they\u2019ve spent a lot of money and they wouldn\u2019t want to let go of an object.\u201d<\/p>\n
The idol is among those allegedly trafficked by Subhash Kapoor, a former Manhattan art dealer who was the subject of a massive US federal investigation known as Operation Hidden Idol.<\/p>\n
Kapoor was arrested in Germany in 2012 and is now on trial in India, accused of conspiring in the theft, trafficking and sale of religious idols. He denies all charges.<\/p>\n
Many of the antiquities he dealt in dated back to the 11th and 12th centuries, when the Chola dynasty presided over a flourishing of Hindu art in Tamil Nadu.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis operation went on for many years,\u201d said Prateep V Philip, who heads Tamil Nadu\u2019s Idol Wing \u2014 India\u2019s only police team dedicated to tackling art theft.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe (Kapoor) was himself not on the scene, but he was the mastermind.\u201d<\/p>\n
Philip said Kapoor won over the international art world by donating millions of dollars\u2019 worth of pieces to museums in the United States.<\/p>\n
He ran his own freight company in India, allegedly concealing priceless antiques among modern replicas.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhenever a theft took place in the past, sometimes people were not even aware,\u201d said Philip, describing the thousands of small shrines that dot the state as \u201ceasy prey\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt would be a derelict temple only visited at certain times of the year. So when a theft took place it was discovered long after.\u201d<\/p>\n
This means much of India\u2019s stolen sacred art is never even registered as missing, allowing it to be bought and sold on the international market.<\/p>\n
Donna Yates, who lectures in antiquities trafficking at the University of Glasgow, said she was \u201cabsolutely flabbergasted\u201d when it emerged the Australian gallery\u2019s statue was stolen.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf you\u2019d asked me in 2011 (before Kapoor\u2019s arrest) whether this kind of thing was still possible, I\u2019d have said no. I believed the due diligence of museums had vastly improved,\u201d she said in a phone interview.<\/p>\n
Since the arrest, Washington has returned hundreds of artefacts recovered under Operation Hidden Idol to India.<\/p>\n
But idols are still disappearing. This year, Philip\u2019s team arrested an art dealer in Chennai after recovering hundreds of metal and stone statues of Hindu gods from a warehouse.<\/p>\n
Yates believes the grassroots work of the IPP in documenting cases of theft and bringing them to public attention is crucial \u2014 and unmatched anywhere in the world.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe amount that they\u2019ve been able to do with zero resources is amazing. It has happened nowhere else,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
The volunteers, who are all passionate about Indian art, go through old catalogues from auction houses, using any blemishes or imperfections to match lots with idols stolen from temples.<\/p>\n
Founded by two Singapore-based art enthusiasts, it now includes activists from all over the world.<\/p>\n
The work is unpaid, but Venkatraman says it is all worth it when an idol is returned to the temple it belongs in.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen finally the idol is restituted, the temple comes alive,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a kind of cycle… Once that cycle is complete it\u2019s like saying, ok, the puzzle is finally solved.\u201d\u2014AFP<\/p>\n
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