NEW YORK, NEW YORK, August 18, 2019 (NY Times): Officials of the Indian government and the Metropolitan Museum of Art are discussing whether a number of prized antiquities that the museum began acquiring three decades ago were the product of looting by Subhash Kapoor, a Manhattan art dealer accused of being one of the world’s most prolific smugglers of stolen artifacts. Since 1990, the Met has acquired some 15 antiquities that passed through Mr. Kapoor’s hands during a period in which, the authorities say, his smuggling ring was active and he routinely sold or donated rare and costly artifacts to at least a dozen American museums. The discussions are part of a major push by India to recover some of the tens of thousands of sacred statues and ancient relics now known to have been plundered in the last half-century by a variety of smugglers and temple raiders.
“As we have since learned of the multiple law enforcement actions, and in the spirit of our enhanced procedures over recent years, we are now seeking to identify additional provenance information,” the museum said in a statement. “It is a good initiative,” D.M. Dimri, a spokesman for the Archaeological Survey of India, said of the Met’s effort. His agency is responsible for safeguarding India’s most illustrious objects and monuments. “We hope other museums will follow suit too and verify the source of their acquisitions in case they have our stolen antiquities.”