As reports of Tagore memorabilia that had allegedly gone missing from Rabindra Bhavan in Mungpo in Darjeeling sent officials in a tizzy, the authorities issued a show-cause notice to Sishir Routh, the ‘caretaker’ of the Rabindra Museum, on Friday for speaking to the media.
While a flurry of activities and a series of meetings began, the Director of Cinchona plantation and other medicinal plants in West Bengal, Dr Samuel Rai, who was associated with the museum when a committee was formed during renovation, later said they had found all the “missing” memorabilia. He, however, also said all the materials they had collected earlier and kept in safe custody were replicas brought from Shantiniketan.
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Dr Rai held a meeting with Routh and others, including the contractor engaged in renovation work of the house, where the Nobel laureate, Rabindranath Tagore, stayed during his visits to the Hills, sources said.
Though Dr Rai initially claimed that no Tagore memorabilia was lost and admitted that all the displayed documents and photos were replicas, he failed to say where the original ones were.
READ | Historic papers go ‘missing’ from Tagore museum
“Before renovation, the memorabilia were kept in safe custody, while they were displayed after renovation in the presence of the representative of state heritage commission, Arunendu Banerjee,” he claimed.
However, interestingly, Dr Rai telephoned this correspondent in the evening again and said: “The truth has come finally out and all the materials collected during renovation, which were kept under lock and key, have been found intact in the factory office this afternoon.”
It may be mentioned here that Routh had spoken about his impression about the house and had talked about its “lost glory” and questioned the ‘originality’ of the house and other memorabilia there.
In an interview a few days ago, Routh had also claimed that he failed to find documents that he had handed over to the authorities before renovation and that they were “still missing”. However, as he was show-caused today, he denied making such statements to the media, according to sources.
Asked to comment, Dr Rai said: “Actually nothing was lost. This is number one point. Secondly, what we have here are all duplicate papers and photographs that we got from Santiniketan last time when the Heritage Commission repaired this house.”
“We collected all materials what were there and kept them in a box in the government-run factory office, which is close to that house at Mungpo. There is a committee to look after the renovation work. Everything was under the custody of the officials, associated with the factory and all those were kept under lock and key,” Dr Rai told The Statesman over the phone.
According to him, they have show-caused Mr Routh. “I don’t know on what grounds he said those things,” he said.
“Arunendu Banerjee from Santiniketan brought all the items, and all are replicas. The only original thing is the bed, a chair and a table. I don’t know where those original documents Kabiguru left here are. There is no reason anyone can steal from here,” Dr Rai said on Friday.
When asked repeatedly to comment on the original memorabilia, he said: “Before renovation, something like Xerox copies were there, (which) got distorted.”
Mr Routh too told this correspondent today that “some photocopies of documents were damaged due to fog (damp) and other reasons.”
Surprisingly, Dr Rai later telephoned this correspondent around 4.10 pm and said: “The truth has come out now. I am sure nothing was lost. I have found out the truth. I don’t know what items were missing as per newspaper reports, but what happened is that the representative of the State Heritage Commission, Mr Arunendu Banerjee, who brought over 200 items (replicas) from Santiniketan, said ‘why will we keep such dirty things in the newly-built museum, and he finally suggested displaying the fresh replicas.”
“We just found, after meeting with some officials, that many of those items are intact, including photographs kept under lock and key in our office. Any interested person can come and see those items,” he added.
