SINGAPORE: Hindus have welcomed Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott’s gesture of returning back to India on Friday the 900-years-old bronze Shiva Nataraja and granulite Ardhanarishvara statues reportedly stolen from temples in India, which were worth millions of dollars.
President of Universal Society of Hinduism, Rajan Zed, said in a statement issued from Nevada, US on Saturday, that the gesture was a “step in the right direction.”
The Shiva Nataraja statue was reportedly stolen from a temple in Sripuranthan village in Ariyalur district of Tamil Nadu. Ardhanarishvara is also said to be from a Tamil Nadu temple.
Zed asked that all museums and art galleries in the world to exhaustively re-examine the procurement process and the provenance of their Hindu art collections, and if proved stolen, return it to the Hindu temples they originally belonged.
“When acquiring new Hindu artifacts in the future, these institutions should make sure that these were not looted from Hindu religious centres and should follow strict due diligence procedures as well as have transparent provenance.
Pillaging of Hindu temples and archeological sites for mercantile greed is not okay,” he said. -Bernama
