Fugitive businessman Nirav Modi’s rare paintings and antiques worth crores have been seized by the government on Tuesday and set to be auctioned off.
Saffronart, the auction house appointed to conduct the sale has put paintings by Modi will be part of their Spring Live auction of Modern and Contemporary Art, that also includes works of national art treasure Raja Ravi Varma and modern artist VS Gaitonde. His expensive Chinese paintings are also part of the auction.
68 paintings will be auctioned on behalf of the tax recovery officer of the Income Tax department. The sale might begin at 7 pm on Tuesday as per reports. The estimate worth of the total artwork stands between Rs 30 and Rs 50 crore.
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Earlier, a special court in Mumbai has consented to the Tax department to undertake the auction and deposit the proceeds to the court till further orders.
Modi is a defaulter of Income Tax also, so the department took permission of the court for auctioning these paintings which were seized by Enforcement Directorate in PNB case investigation.
Modi was arrested by the Scotland Yard in connection with a loan default case in India on last Tuesday. He was produced before a London court which sent him to the jail after rejecting his plea for bail. He will be in the judicial custody till March 29.
(With inputs from ANI)