London:
A spinning wheel or '
charkha' re-invented by Mahatma Gandhi during his time at Pune's Yerwada jail in 1940s will go under the hammer at the prestigious British auction house Mullock's on November 5 with the minimum bid set at 60,000 pounds.
While there's a traditional
charkha that the Mahatma is associated with, not many people know that he improvised on the spinning wheel and invented a new foldable version at the Pune jail.
Richard Westwood-Brookes, an expert at the Mullock's auction house in Ludlow near Birmingham says the Mahatma gave the
charkha to an American priest Revd Floyd A Puffer.
"This material that we are selling now, none of it has come from India. Gandhi gave it to an American priest and he kept it with him for several years," he said.
Under the British Raj, cotton grown in India was shipped to the UK for making garments, which were then shipped back to India and sold at a price that the people could not afford. In order to resist the British, Gandhi encouraged Indians to use the
charkha and spin and weave their own cloth.
Other memorabilia - 60 items in all - belonging to Mahatma Gandhi will also be sold in a few weeks from now in a major auction.
The sale of Gandhi's artifacts abroad has been an emotive issue. When James Otis, a peace activist, wanted to sell Gandhi's items in the US, there was uproar in India. The latest auction too has stirred a controversy. "Mahatma Gandhi is a symbol of India's independence. His items must remain in India," said prominent British-Indian lawyer Sarosh Zaiwalla.
While in the past, the Indian government has requested wealthy NRIs to buy such items when up for sale, no such move is planned for this particular auction.