Heirs Decry 'Immoral' Sale of Gandhi's Stuff

Tycoon pays $1.8m for Gandhi glasses, watch, sandals to donate to government

(NEWSER) - The few worldly possessions that Mahatma Gandhi left behind will be returning to his homeland after an Indian tycoon bought them at a controversial New York auction yesterday, the Washington Post reports. Vijay Mallya paid $1.8 million for the independence leader's spectacles, pocket watch and sandals, and pledged to donate them to India's government. More»

(NEWSER) - India has rejected a donation offer from the owner of Mahatma Gandhi’s personal effects, set for auction today in New York, the Times reports. James Otis, a peace activist who owns Gandhi’s glasses, watch, and sandals, wanted India to exhibit the items or increase spending on its poor to 5% of GDP. Even Gandhi “would not have agreed to conditions,” an official said. More»

Heritage Auctions ignores Mongolia's restraining order

(NEWSER) - A New York auction house sold off a dinosaur skeleton for $1 million yesterday despite a restraining order from the Mongolian government, which said the find had been illegally exported, New Scientist reports. Heritage Auctions kept mum about the seller and winning bidder, and said it had "legal assurances" that the near-complete tyrannosaurus "was obtained legally." A lawyer for Mongolia, however, said the auction house planned to hold back the sale until courts settled the dispute. More»

Shirt bears names of city, King of Swing

(NEWSER) - The Great Bambino's baseball jersey has knocked one out of the park. Babe Ruth's cotton No. 44 shirt grabbed a hefty $4.4 million at auction. The road jersey worn by the Sultan of Swat in the 1920s busted a record for sports memorabilia. The previous record-holder—the original rules for basketball—went for $4.3 million. Ruth's jersey sports "New York" in big blue letters across the chest, and "Ruth, G.H."—for Ruth, George Herman—in pink script along the back of the neckline, notes the New York Daily News . More»

Biography seeks to end hagiography of the leader of Indian independence

(NEWSER) - Mohandas Gandhi may have been a great man, leading India to independence, but he was also a great jerk, leading a life of racism, self-promotion, sexual weirdness, and cruelty—or so says the new biography Great Soul, by former New York Times executive editor Joseph Lelyveld. Gandhi's early biographers dubbed him a "moral demi-god," but Lelyveld's book shows a much more human image. "Gandhi was therefore the archetypal 20th-century progressive intellectual," writes Andrew Roberts in his review in the Wall Street Journal , "professing his love for mankind as a concept while actually despising people as individuals." More»