M K Gandhi's Relics

On March 6, 2009 five personal articles belonging to Gandhiji were bought by India’s liquor baron V J Mallaya for about 1.8 million dollars at an auction in New York by Antiquorum Auctioneers.

Here is a poem I wrote on that occasion. The poem may interest the readers. 

GANDHI’S RELICS

A brass bowl and a plate

A pocket watch

A pair of leather chappals

A pair of spectacles:

The Father of the Nation’s mementos

The Mahatma’s legacy

The essential Gandhi  -

Being put to auction!

How can they do it?

Commercialize Gandhi

Put him on sale 

His simplicity

His non-violence

His message of peace

His sainthood

His quintessential humanity!

But they did it

In spite of our best efforts

But at least

We did not let anyone else

Usurp his legacy

We bought it

And brought it home

Through a playboy liquor baron
Paying two million dollars

Now through these relics

We shall keep

Bapu’s legacy

Embalmed and entombed in glass
Museumized

To be reverenced

To be looked upon with awe

To be shown to our children

To be preserved for posterity

Against time’s corrosion

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