Closure report filed in Raza’s ‘Prakriti’ theft
An A summary was filed by the police on Wednesday after recording statements of witnesses, checking various logs of the warehouse and CCTV footages
MUMBAI: Nearly seven months after an S H Raza painting, worth around ₹2.50 crore, was stolen from the prominent AstaGuru Auction House Private Limited’s warehouse in Ballard Pier, the MRA Marg police have closed the case.
An A summary was filed by the police on Wednesday after recording statements of witnesses, checking various logs of the warehouse and CCTV footages. An A summary is filed when the case is true but the crime remains undetected, in the absence of any clue leading to possible culprits.
The case was registered by the MRA Marg police station in September 2024, following a complaint about the missing canvas by the auction house’s administrative officer Siddhant Shetty.
“We had registered a case when a painting of renowned artist Sayed Haider Raza titled ‘Prakriti’ (Nature) priced around ₹2.50 crore had gone missing from the warehouse in Ballard Pier. The work was kept there during the Covid-19 pandemic,” said an officer from the police station.
The painting was made by the Paris-based artist in 1992, who died in 2016 at the age of 94. The 47.2X15.7-inch 1992 acrylic on canvas, which showcased Raza’s evolution from early abstract landscapes to spiritual geometric configurations, was last seen in March 2022. The work was kept in the warehouse in 2020 by its owner, a certain Inder Veer, a Mumbai resident. When he wanted the painting to be auctioned in 2024, along with works of M F Husain, Krishen Khanna and Anjolie Ela Menon by the auction house, officials at the warehouse could not locate it among the stash of over 1500 paintings. “We had registered a case under IPC section 380 for theft,” said the police officer.
“After the case was registered, we asked for CCTV footages of the warehouse. However, due to a lapse in time (between 2022-24) we could not get the specific footage. We then recorded statements of over 15 employees of the warehouse, none of who could recall anything about the painting, except that they had last seen it in 2022,” said the police officer.
He elaborated, “Though there is a thumb entry system to enter the warehouse, limited employees can access it. As a long time had passed, it was difficult to fix a blame on anyone.”
Finally, it was decided to close the case and file an A Summary, he added.
