The thefts had come to light about a year ago when the Lahore Fort's Sikh Gallery was broken into. The Tibbi police station has filed away the case. The federal government's Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism has not even bothered to fix responsibility for the theft and seems to have accepted the incident as a fair accompli. It has also taken no steps to improve security arrangments at the Fort or other monuments and museums elsewhere in the country. The only action taken by the department was termination of the service of two watchmen, Abdul Saeed Khan and Muhammad Ramzan, who were on duty between 12 midnight and 8am on that day. They, along with two more watchmen, were taken into custody by the Tibbi City police and given a good thrashing during the course of interrogation.
According to a description in the department's catalogue of 1961, the horse trappings of Maharaja Ranjit Singh were in several pieces. These were a "Sar Band (decorative head covers) comprising 77 small and six-medium size flowers in gold plate with eight petals, each of them-studded with turquoise, a 'teeka' weighing 10 tolas of gold with 10-pendants of 100t[ one 'qalghi' (forehead ornament) and two solid-gold buckles. Both the 'teeka' and 'qalghi' were studded with diamonds. The "Seena Bund (chest cover)" is 4'-11" long with 35 small and two-medium size flowers of plate gold weighing 20 tolas. Each flower has eight petals studded with 14 turquoise and a diamond, a-medallion of 10 tolas of gold set with large piece of turquoise and other small beads of stones. The "Dum Gaz (tail-piece)" is 5'-6" long with small flowers of gold-weighing 32 tolas of gold, two medium size buckles and one big buckle of solid gold weighing two tolas and 10 tolas, respectively, studded with jewels and precious and semi-precious stons".
But the FIR (No 800O96) got registered by curator Irshad Husain under Section 457 PPC (lurking house trespass or house breaking by night in order to commit offense punishable with imprisonment for five to-14 years with fine) and 380 PPC (theft in dwellingsOhouses etc., punishable with seven years of imprisonment and fine), simply mentions that the trappings consisted of "gold plated" material. In the first instance no details of the theft were given and the complaint said the "main portion of the horse trappings and umbrella of Ranjit Singh are missing".
The Sikh Gallery was established in 1961 and antiquities displayed there belonged to the collection of Princess Bamba, daughter of Maharaja Duleep Singh and Ranjit's Singh's grand-daughter. Duleep Singh had married the princesses' mother, Bamba Muller in England after his father's dynasty came to an end in 1849, and had another daughter and three sons from her.Princess Bamba married an English baron and later came to live in the Punjab. She died in Lahore, issuless, in 1957 at the age of 86. All the years she was in Lahore, she kept her collection, inherited from her father Duleep Singh, which also included paintings, photographs and metallic objects and articles, under the management of Pir Karam Bakhsh Sipra to whom she bequeathed the inheritance before she died. Mr Supra later sold this to the Government of Pakistan though the Indian government had also showed interest in purchasing it. The collection was put on public display in a specially built Sikh Gallery inaugurated in 1961.
Archaelogoy Department DG Niaz Rasool stated among other things in his first report to the ministry on Oct 20, 1996, that curator Irshad Husain, complainant in the case, did not hold physical charge of the Sikh Gallery. The responsibility rested with assistant curator Habib Ghani who was granted two-day leave for Oct 13 and Oct 14, 1996 by the director, north circle, himself, though sanctioning of such leave was within the competence of the curator who was present in the office the day the leave was approved. In the second report on Feb 6, 1997, the Director General referred to an investigation conducted by the director, north circle, and said the director's report was not only silent on fixing of responsibility but also had many lapses which suggested that the inquiry was not conducted properly. The report neither offered a comment on the incident nor mentioned anything about future steps for security. The-DG also reported that while lodging the FIR the curator had stated that "gold-plated" objects were stolen whereas the horse trappings were actually made of gold. When contacted by Dawn, northern circle director Ehsan Nadeem said the "gold plated" trappings were a replica of the original. Departmental inquiries showed that no staff member was involved and subsequent inquiries by the ministry also ended with the same conclusion. "It is-a simple case of theft, no more". He said termination from service was the maximum punishment the-department could have awarded to the watchmen. According to him, a residential colony of subordinate employees inside the Fort seemed to be the place of trouble but no evidence against any of them. There was no check on employees' movement. Mr Nadeem said about 40 percent of the horse trappings were stolen, the rest being safe. The mangement, he added, might remove the "plated-gold" horse trapping to be kept in safe custody. The stuffed horse might be decorated with "replica of the same in gold-plated material". Whetever the measures the Lahore Fort management may take, the people of the Punjab have lost a rich heritage whose value cannot be estimated in terms of money.-