Chandigarh failed to bring back the wotks of its designer

Decades after master architect Le Corbusier designed Chandigarh, the only planned city in independent India, its administration is fighting to retrieve his artefacts which have been auctioned in France.

After failing to stall the Feb 16 auction of Corbusier's works in Paris, the administration is now looking for a glitch in the sale so that it can sue.

Ignoring a notice from the Chandigarh union territory's government, Paris-based auction house Artcurial had auctioned works of Corbusier and his team -- including wooden carvings of sketches, graphs and drawings prepared under the supervision of the architect.

In the notice served to the director of Artcurial, the administration had stated that the designs and carvings are the property of Chandigarh; therefore the auction should be cancelled as it is illegal.

The communication said: "It is not known how these items have reached you as they are the property of the Chandigarh government. We had never handed over these items to anybody. There can be a situation that this material was either stolen or are replicas."

Chandigarh's Finance-cum-Urban Planning Secretary Sanjay Kumar said: "Immediately after getting information about the auction of Le Corbusier's works in France, we informed the auction house about our stand. We had asked them to verify the origin of the items, which had gone under the hammer.

"We have already formed a committee to look into the matter and if we discover that auctioned material was the property of the Chandigarh administration then we will certainly take legal action. Otherwise if we find that they have replicated the original masterpieces of Corbusier then we will ask their authorities to initiate a probe."

According to sources, around 100 items related to Corbusier and his team were sold during the auction. It fetched nearly 1.2 million euros (about US$1.8 million).

A French man associated with the Le Corbusier foundation in Paris had informed the administration about the auction.

The Chandigarh administration has also sent copies of the notice to the Indian embassy in Paris, the French embassy in New Delhi and the director of the Le Corbusier foundation in Paris.

Corbusier, who was born in Switzerland and became a French citizen in his 30s, had designed this union territory in the 1950s.

Some senior officials have expressed concern over the possibility of theft of precious items related to Corbusier from Chandigarh.

"The items that were reportedly auctioned in Paris were never displayed in Chandigarh. They must have been placed in the union territory's stores from where they could have been stolen by some miscreants," a senior official of the administration said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

He added: "There are also instances when the administration lends these artefacts to art lovers to make replicas. So we cannot deny the possibility where somebody has not returned it and smuggled it to France. In the past also many items of Corbusier were auctioned in France right under the nose of the authorities."

Chandigarh has a museum, built in memory of Corbusier, in Sector 19 at the same place where the architect used to sit while designing the city. The museum showcases original works of Corbusier and his team of architects.

"All the designs, maps and artefacts related to Corbusier and his team of architects are intact in our centre. I have personally checked everything and nothing is missing from here," Vidya Nand Singh, nodal officer of the Le Corbusier centre and museum here, said.

The administration has formed a committee headed by the chief architect of the city to check the items related to Corbusier and to find out if there is anything missing.

In his career that spanned over five decades, Corbusier designed buildings in central Europe, India, Russia and in North and South America. Besides being an architect, he was a modern furniture designer, painter and sculptor