Principal suspended for fake Tagore event
22 Oct 2012 7:26 AM IST
The principal of the Government College of Art and Craft, Dipali Bhattacharya, who organised an exhibition of fake Tagore paintings last year has been charged and suspended in an ongoing case being fought at the Calcutta high court. Bhattacharya, allegedly responsible for a fake Tagore painting scam, is known to have enjoyed the patronage of the previous Left Front government.
The state Higher Education Department, in a letter dated 17 October 2012, ordered that Bhattacharya was further restrained from doing duties in the college and also asked her not to leave the country without the prior permission of the state government. It has asked Jayanta Chaudhuri, the officer in charge of the college, to initiate suspension proceedings against the principal.
Coinciding with the state government's action, some artists have lodged a first information report in the New Market Police Station against Bhattacharya and Jogen Chowdhury, the eminent artist who had bought one of the fake paintings, and Jayanta Banerjee, a Dhanbad-based businessman, from whose collection the paintings reached the exhibition.
When asked about his reaction about the police complaint, Chowdhury said: 'I have never been involved in any negative or wrong activity, leave alone criminal activity. I had just collected only one painting and I was cheated.'
Bhattacharya had organised the exhibition of 20 Tagore paintings [later proved to be fakes by a probe panel led by the ASI] from 27 February to 8 March 2011 to commemorate the poet's 150th birth anniversary.
The high court verdict invoked the Antiquities and Art Treasures Act, 1972, and was prompted by a PIL filed by the sculptor Tapas Sarkar. Prof. R Siva Kumar, a Kala Bhavan professor at Visva-Bharati, too, had pronounced the paintings fake after seeing their digital images. He had warned Bhattacharya against holding the exhibition, but she went ahead with it.
On 28 September, the court had expressed annoyance at the state government's apparent reluctance to take action in the matter and said that it would hear the case after the Durga Puja.
The state Higher Education Department, in a letter dated 17 October 2012, ordered that Bhattacharya was further restrained from doing duties in the college and also asked her not to leave the country without the prior permission of the state government. It has asked Jayanta Chaudhuri, the officer in charge of the college, to initiate suspension proceedings against the principal.
Coinciding with the state government's action, some artists have lodged a first information report in the New Market Police Station against Bhattacharya and Jogen Chowdhury, the eminent artist who had bought one of the fake paintings, and Jayanta Banerjee, a Dhanbad-based businessman, from whose collection the paintings reached the exhibition.
When asked about his reaction about the police complaint, Chowdhury said: 'I have never been involved in any negative or wrong activity, leave alone criminal activity. I had just collected only one painting and I was cheated.'
Bhattacharya had organised the exhibition of 20 Tagore paintings [later proved to be fakes by a probe panel led by the ASI] from 27 February to 8 March 2011 to commemorate the poet's 150th birth anniversary.
The high court verdict invoked the Antiquities and Art Treasures Act, 1972, and was prompted by a PIL filed by the sculptor Tapas Sarkar. Prof. R Siva Kumar, a Kala Bhavan professor at Visva-Bharati, too, had pronounced the paintings fake after seeing their digital images. He had warned Bhattacharya against holding the exhibition, but she went ahead with it.
On 28 September, the court had expressed annoyance at the state government's apparent reluctance to take action in the matter and said that it would hear the case after the Durga Puja.
Next Story
