Baroda museum saddled with X-ray machine for patients

VADODARA, JULY 19: The Baroda Museum has got 60,000 antiques under its roof. Two years back it decided to buy an X-ray machine to examine ...

VADODARA, JULY 19: The Baroda Museum has got 60,000 antiques under its roof. Two years back it decided to buy an X-ray machine to examine damage to paintings and other objects. Since then the machine has been lying in the museum store. The reason: it is meant for examining patients!

It has been a costly goof-up. The machine was procured at a cost of Rs 2.5 lakh, the amount taken from a Rs 5-lakh grant the museum had received. If the right machine had been bought, only Rs 60,000 would have been spent.

Sources allege there is more to this incident than meets the eye. X-ray machines meant for paintings have to be imported since they are not manufactured in India. The museum purchased it locally.

Picture restorer B.M.Mali had placed the order and is being blamed for the goof-up, but he brushes off the charge: 8220;Mistakes do happen but nobody has opened the X-ray machine8217;s wrapper yet to find out whether it can be used for examining paintings. You can8217;t jump to a conclusion straightaway.8221; He adds: 8220;We simply don8217;t have a power point to plug in the machine to know the truth.8221;

However, Curator Arts Satish Sadasivan says a radiologist from the S.S.G. Hospital had examined the machine and confirmed that it was meant only for humans and not objects of art.

Sources say Sadasivan has recommended to the Director of Museums that Mali be dismissed for this goof-up as well as for other lapses. At least three in-charge directors handled the case but none bothered to take action.

Mali has also been accused of letting damage be caused to a painting, Holy Family, by Bonifazio Veronese. An assistant of his, while removing a nail from the inner frame, grazed the painting with the point. Moreover, frames were removed from many European paintings last year to allow a photographer a clear view of the masterpieces.

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Mali says he isn8217;t aware how the nail got stuck in the painting. 8220;Such damage is common. I can show you around to prove the point,8221; he says, arguing that it must be unintentional.

He has got his own allegations to make about the museum. He demonstrates that a 8220;Rs 5 lakh8221; burglar alarm doesn8217;t work. 8220;None of the pieces of the alarm system are connected. How will the alarm go off?8221; he asks. 8220;I am being blamed for every thing by people jealous of my air-conditioned cabin,8221; he says.

He holds a bachelor8217;s degree in applied arts though picture restorers are meant to have degrees in either chemistry or painting. Mali retorts: 8220;Why does the government allow me to continue in the post if I am unfit?8221; He says he has undergone two years8217; training in restoration in Delhi.

Whatever may be the truth, the charges and counter-charges, the squandering of grants and the condition of the museum indicate the rot at the heart of it all.