Much respected Indian journalist Hasan Suroor writes:
Dan Hicks, professor of Contemporary Archaeology at Oxford University, described it as an attempt to “distract from restitution demands”. Calling it “cultural usury”, he said it was “time to return stolen art and culture and build new equitable relationships” with former colonies.
Christine Edge of Sotheby’s Institute of Art, Cambodia, said: “You cannot share something you stole. Either give it back, or keep it. You are the ones who stole it, sharing is off the table at this point: unless you give it back, and whatever country you stole it from decides to share it with you.”
Announced with much fanfare, museum director Nicholas Cullinan had called the three-year loan of ‘contested’ objects a positive form of “cultural diplomacy”. Sabyasachi Mukherjee, director-general of the CSMVS, had welcomed the move, saying that it would help us to “emerge with dignity” from years of colonisation.
Meanwhile, hundreds of purloined items remain in the British Museum, and India’s ‘nationalist’ government remains conspicuously silent.
