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yesterday

Modi Inaugurates Delhi Exhibition Reuniting Repatriated Piprahwa Relics

Public viewing begins January 4 after India halted a Sotheby’s sale, with a Godrej-backed acquisition enabling the relics’ return.

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India has recovered a set of relics with ties to early Buddhism more than a century after they were removed from the country during the colonial period
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India's Minister of Culture Gajendra Singh Shekhawat performed a ritual in July to mark the the repatriation of the Piprahwa relics, which have since been displayed in public at an exhibition in New Delhi

Overview

  • Prime Minister Narendra Modi on January 3 opened “The Light & the Lotus: Relics of the Awakened One” at the Rai Pithora Cultural Complex in New Delhi.
  • The show reunites the repatriated Piprahwa gem relics with authenticated materials held by the National Museum in New Delhi and the Indian Museum in Kolkata, including bone fragments, reliquaries and a sandstone coffer.
  • The exhibition opens to the public on January 4 for a run of several weeks and features immersive galleries that trace the 1898 discovery and the 1971–75 excavations.
  • A planned Sotheby’s Hong Kong auction in May 2025 was stopped after a legal notice from India, and Pirojsha Godrej purchased 349 gemstones with a five-year loan to the National Museum.
  • Officials cite a Brahmi inscription tying the relics to the Buddha and the Sakya clan at ancient Kapilavastu, as the government frames the return as cultural restoration and outreach to global Buddhist communities.