Idol thief cons central, state agencies

CHENNAI: A man who allegedly masterminded major idol thefts in Tamil Nadu, Sanjeevi Asokan continues to sing from a Tiruchi prison, revealing details of his ingenious racket which hoodwinked both central and state agencies. For years, Asokan is believed to have conned the handicrafts wing under the union textiles ministry and the customs to ship antique idols to an Indian buyer in the US.The man, who runs an antique shop as well as an art gallery in New York, had purchased the bulk of stolen idols from Asokan for an estimated cost of Rs 4 crore, said police sources.
Asokan has told the probe agency that the art gallery owner in the US had pinpointed the objets d���art in Tamil Nadu that he needed, and had asked Asokan to get it for him. Money would be wired to Asokan���s bank accounts which now lie frozen. ���Though, in India we don���t have facilities to record the antique value of idols in temples, we have enough details to establish the links in Asokan���s export of panchaloha idols to the US,��� IG - EOW S Rajendran said.
To skirt bureaucratic hurdles involved in shipping stolen antique idols abroad, Asokan had conned some officials and bought off others. His modus operandi: First, he approached the handicrafts wing under the ministry of textiles with fake bills of handicrafts to get a no-objection certificate, sources in CB-CID said. The officials were told that his goods were recent sculptures or handicrafts of no antique value. Asokan, who ran a licensed art gallery ���Arcelia Art Gallery��� at his residence cum office in Triplicane since 2000, had meanwhile obtained a license for exporting antiques. He would then mix antique pieces with freshly minted idols and pack them tightly together, as per customs norms, to avoid easy detection.
Sources said officials in the handicrafts wing should have inspected the consignments thoroughly before certifying that idols were newly bought. It seems that they had certified them even without inspections. The handicrafts wing has a team of officials to screen sculptures for their antique value. On an inkling of doubt, they are supposed to hold its back and refer them to the Archaeological Survey of India.
With NOCs routinely handed out by the handicrafts department, Asokan had booked his consignments for export. Here too, all these years he had evaded the net. An official said the customs department should not have trusted the NOCs blindly. They could have approached ASI to cross-check the claim, the officer added. Customs is known to carry out random searches of containers based on tip-offs but in Asokan���s case, his racket went unnoticed for several years.
A senior police officer told TOI that Asokan had exported panchaloha idols to the US, the UK, Germany and France. ���We have collected copies of consignment receipts under Asokan���s gallery name and the customs original bill. The consignment was addressed to the private art gallery in New York, which is run by an Indian. Within a month of the consignment reaching the destination in the US, Asokan received Rs 2.5 crore in dollars from the art gallery owner in staggered instalments. The money was sent by wire transfer to Asokan���s account in a private bank in Adyar. Similarly, he had received Rs 1.5 crore from the same gallery owner in 2008 for his next consignment,��� a CB-CID officer said.
���We know it is a cumbersome process to retrieve stolen idols. If the person who bought the idols in the US talks, then we can easily get them back. If needed, we will interrogate the gallery owner to get more details in this case,��� the officer said. In March this year, the CB-CID sent a detailed letter to the CBI to use the Interpol, to retrieve stolen idols purchased by the art gallery in New York and another in Hong Kong.