Koh-I-Noor

[Vidyasankar Sundaresan]

>To ask for Kohinoor, that can be claimed by a few other nations besides
>India, is a devious way promoting ill-will.
>
>Another example of bureacratic ignorance compounded by legislative hubris
>!!!
>best,

I think the whole motion is extremely ill advised. In India,
when a gift is given, it goes with an explicit "na mama"
attached to it. It is simply crude to ask for its return.
If an Indian prince gave a diamond in his possession to the
British queen, it was a gift. As an inheritor of the rights
of the said prince, the modern Indian state has no more right
over the diamond. The situation is not at all analogous to
that of stolen artefacts like the Pathur Nataraja. I hope
someone in Delhi realizes that this idea of asking for the
return of the Koh-i-noor is not only stupid, it also goes
compltely against the Indian tradition (or for that matter,
any civilized idea) of a gift.

Vidyasankar
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