PM Modi unveils ‘The Light & The Lotus’ as Piprahwa gems return home after 127 years

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will inaugurate The Light & The Lotus: Relics of the Awakened One in New Delhi on January 3, marking the public homecoming of the Piprahwa Gems —sacred Buddhist relics that returned to India after spending more than a century abroad.

The exhibition, organised by the Ministry of Culture, chronicles the journey of the relics, taken from India in 1898 and repatriated last year.

Housed at the Rai Pithora Cultural Complex, the exhibition brings together the Buddha relics alongside an immersive display of 88 antiquities, a repatriation gallery, and a detailed model of the original excavation site. The exhibition will open to the public from January 4.

Described by auction house Sotheby’s as “among the most extraordinary archaeological discoveries of all time,” the relics were found buried in reliquaries alongside corporeal remains believed to be those of the historical Buddha.

What are the Piprahwa Gems?

The Piprahwa antiquities comprise 349 gemstones unearthed in 1898 by English estate manager William Claxton Peppé at a Buddhist stupa in Piprahwa village, located in Uttar Pradesh’s Siddharthnagar district near the Nepal border. Following the discovery, the British Crown claimed the relics under the Indian Treasure Trove Act of 1878.

While the bulk of the find—including nearly 1,800 pearls, rubies, sapphires, topaz, and patterned gold sheets — was transferred to what is now the Indian Museum in Kolkata, around one-fifth of the collection, largely duplicates, was retained by Peppé.

These gems remained within the Peppé family for generations and were offered for auction by Chris Peppé in 2013. Sotheby’s Hong Kong later listed the collection in May last year, with an estimated value exceeding $100 million.

Also associated with the Piprahwa discovery are sacred bones and ash believed to belong to Lord Buddha. These were donated by then Viceroy Elgin to King Rama V of Siam.

How India secured the relics’ return

Following the auction announcement, the Ministry of Culture issued a legal notice on May 5, 2025, to Sotheby’s and the Peppé family, calling for the immediate halt of the auction and the repatriation of the relics. The notice asserted that the collection — comprising bone fragments, stone and crystal caskets, a sandstone coffer, and offerings of gold and gemstones—was excavated from the Piprahwa Stupa, widely identified as ancient Kapilavastu, the Shakya capital where Prince Siddhartha spent his early life.

India maintained that the relics constitute an inalienable religious and cultural heritage of the country and the global Buddhist community, and that their sale violated Indian law, international conventions, and United Nations agreements. The Archaeological Survey of India also sought intervention from the Indian Consulate in Hong Kong to stop the auction.

Although the auction was suspended, India’s legal claim remained complex. The excavation had taken place on land granted to Peppé by the British government, and the artefacts had left India decades before the Antiquities and Art Treasures Act of 1972 came into force. Despite these challenges, the Ministry of Culture coordinated with international agencies to press India’s case.

A decisive breakthrough came when Indian industrialist Pirojsha Godrej purchased the entire collection of 349 gemstones for an undisclosed sum. Godrej has agreed to loan a significant portion of the collection to the National Museum for five years, with the full set to be displayed for three months upon arrival.

The move ensured the relics’ return without the government entering a commercial transaction—sidestepping ethical concerns while restoring a vital chapter of India’s spiritual and archaeological heritage.