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Going once, going twice, sold! Mementos gifted to Modi auctioned

Last updated on: January 28, 2019 23:34 IST

About 1,800 mementos gifted to Prime Minister Narendra Modi since 2014 were auctioned at the National Gallery of Modern Art in New Delhi on Sunday.

A painting of Modi at a railway station holding a bag with a reserve price of Rs 50,000, and a wooden bike with a base price of Rs 40,000 were sold at Rs 5 lakh each, becoming the highest bids during the two-day physical auction, Culture Minister Mahesh Sharma said.

The funds raised through the auction, held at the National Gallery of Modern Art, Delhi, will go to the government’s flagship project ‘Namami Gange’, a Central government project to clean the Ganga river.

A dedicated site -- http://pmmementos.gov.in -- has been set up to display and e-auction the mementos that are priced between Rs 100 and Rs 30,000.

 

The last day of the physical auction was on Monday, during which 270 of the the 1,900 items were sold, while e-auction of the remaining gifts will begin on the portal on Tuesday and will continue till January 31, he said.

The auction includes statues, photographs, paintings and articles such as angavastram, shawls, commemorative coins, traditional musical instruments, hats, pagris and jackets, etc.

A photo frame of Ashtamangalam with base price of Rs 1,500 was sold for Rs 28,000 while a metallic sword was sold for Rs 1 lakh against its base price of Rs 5,000.

Also the statue of Mahatma Basaveshwara was auctioned at Rs 70,000 against its base price of Rs 10,000.

Take a look at some of the mementos on the auction block.

Union Minister Piyush Goyal at the auction looking at one of the paintings. Photograph: @MinOfCultureGoI/Twitter

The mementos are all that Prime Minister Narendra Modi has received since 2014 when he came to power. Photograph: @MinOfCultureGoI/Twitter

Turbans and shawls are also part of the auction. Photograph: @MinOfCultureGoI/Twitter

This idol of Radha and Krishna, the base price for which has been set at Rs 20,000, is the only gold-plated memento on auction. The 4.76 kg idol was gifted to the prime minister by the Mandvi Nagar Palika in Surat. Photograph: @MinOfCultureGoI/Twitter

A memento entitled New India 2022. Photograph: @MinOfCultureGoI/Twitter

A map of Gujarat with the lotus. Photograph: @MinOfCultureGoI/Twitter

Portrait of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, received from Hari Shankaran, Infrastructure Leasing and Financial Services Limited. Photograph: @MinOfCultureGoI/Twitter

A charkha,received from Jardoli Nagarpalika. Photograph: @MinOfCultureGoI/Twitter

A colourful painting of Mahatma Gandhi which was given to PM Modi. Photograph: @MinOfCultureGoI/Twitter

A replica of the sacred Golden Temple located in Amritsar. Photograph: @MinOfCultureGoI/Twitter

A statue of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj with a base price of Rs 1,000 was sold at Rs 22,000. Modi received this statue on the occasion of the launch of project of smart cities mission on June 25 2016 in Pune. Photograph: @MinOfCultureGoI/Twitter