Mumbai: Meeta Sujan, Woldenberg Professor of Marketing at the Freeman School of Business at Tulane University in New Orleans, has been teaching her students the basics of business-like decision making for decades. Still, there was one decision she had been putting off for years – selling the wealth her family had accumulated over the past two centuries. “I was very sad, because it meant I was ending an era,” she said.
Sir Mangaldas, 72, is a descendant of Nathubhai, one of the 19th-century merchant princes or Sheths, as they were called, of what was then Bombay. Despite being a handful, they not only possessed great wealth but also had significant influence over their respective communities. More importantly, his business interests and philanthropic activities helped build the city.
Mangaldas Nathubhai (referred to as Nathubhoy in some documents), born in 1832, was a well-known figure in the city. Even today, 200 years later, a famous wholesale textile market in South Mumbai is named after him, and the family crest – consisting of two elephants and the motto, ‘Wisdom above wealth’ – adorns the gates and building facades. The road between Grant Road and Girgaum was once called Mangaldas Wadi Road because of his properties on either side of it.
A large portion of the Mangaldas estate, which had passed through Sujan’s family line, has been put up for auction for the first time. This is the most extensive public sale of his movable assets to date. On October 29, Princeps, the Mumbai-headquartered auction house, concluded the sale of rare and old books including James Forbes’ Oriental Memoirs (1813); The Durbar: A Grand Illustrated Record of the Delhi Coronation (1903) by Dorothy and Mortimer Mainpage; and Roopavali (1939), an instruction manual on traditional Indian art forms and iconography by Santiniketan artist Nandalal Bose, who illustrated the Indian Constitution a decade later. One amount received from 53 lots 22.36 lakh. (None of the prices quoted include 25% buyer’s premium.)
Two sales were completed earlier this month. A collection of Chinese pottery, consisting of 38 vases, cups and saucers, figurines from China and Japan, including Satsuma vases, fetched a considerable sum. 15.51 lakh. 18 lots of watches and clocks were sold in another sale 8.91 lakh on 22 October.
Indrajit Chatterjee, founder and curator of Princeps, said, “Since these are historical pieces, they cannot be exported. These pieces would probably have sold for 10 times the higher price in China, where there is a rich market for ceramics.” Given that this is the first auction of its kind of such ceramic pieces in India, the catalog aims to create awareness about the different periods and types of ceramics.
The ongoing auction of British Colonial and Art Deco furniture pieces will end on November 5. Still to be auctioned are silverware, and a rare collection of coins from the Delhi Sultanate and early Mughal period. The dates of those auctions are yet to be announced.
Although Mangaldas received a knighthood in 1875 – his Malabar Hill mansion, Governor’s House, near the Raj Bhavan, was “one of the great social anchors of Bombay” according to Chatterjee – he was also vocal about local needs.
The Maharashtra State Gazetteers noted Mangaldas’s participation in a public protest against the increase in income tax by the Indian government: “The Bombay Association (of which Mangaldas was once president) gave direction to the growing public interest. (…) The third public meeting, attended by about 2,000 people in the Town Hall (…) attracted not only society leaders, but also a large number of small traders, who came to remind the Secretary of State to reject the Indian Income Tax Act of 1870. The speeches were given by Mangaldas Nathubhai, Sir Jamshedji Jijibhai, VJ Shankarshet, Nanabhai Beramji Jijibhai and Narayan V. Dabholkar.
Christine Dibben, author of Urban Leadership in Western India: Politics and Communities in Bombay City 1840–1885, states that Mangaldas was a promoter/director of the Commercial Bank of India and the Chartered Mercantile Bank of India, London and China.
In 1860, during the American Civil War, when cotton exports were extremely profitable, Mangaldas formed the Bombay United Spinning and Weaving Company. But his wealth was by no means unique. The city was filled with wealthy merchants called Sheths, such as Jagannath Shankarshet, Gokuldas Tejpal, Varjivandas Madhavdas, Jamsetji Tata, Sir Cowasji Jahangir Readymoney and Premchand Raichand etc.
The city attracted entrepreneurially minded people, who maintained strong ties with their communities spread across the Bombay Presidency (which included modern-day Gujarat). According to economic historian Radhey Shyam Rungta (The Rise of Business Corporations of India 1851–1900), this proved vital to the success of Indian businessmen who, despite hostile colonial trade policies and laws, obtained manpower and resources from their close ties.
Estate sales often provide collectors and historians a rich source of material for study. It has the potential to confirm or refute theories, and excites the professional collector and amateur city historian alike. In this example, Chatterjee said, the sale allowed his team to not only delve deeper into the businessman’s history, but also study trade patterns between India, China and Japan. For the collector, it offers a rare opportunity to play amateur detective, and provides the sacristy of any collection: provenance.
Take the pair of two-foot-tall Nanking crackleware vases from the Qing dynasty (Kangxi period), hand-painted with battle scenes depicting soldiers on horses and heralds with fierce expressions, which sold out 1.8 lakh. Gently turn them over and you will see the apocryphal Kangshi mark on one and a seal on the other – both of which can be used to date the works.
Nanking crackleware (so named because of the bright appearance of the fine cracks on the surface) was so popular in the 19th century that artisans often produced goods for specific markets, India being one of them. According to Edward Dillon’s richly detailed book, Porcelain (1904), which is part of the Mangaldas estate’s library – an indication that the family studied it before purchasing it – seals and apocryphal marks made in the Chenghua or Kangxi reigns were often used by artisans to tie their wares to the preceding Imperial era. Love of antiques was apparently a popular sentiment even at that time.
The Japanese Satsuma ceramics, which form part of the estate collection, remains a favorite among Mumbai’s elite even today. First developed under the Shimazu clan in the 16th century, Satsuma developed into one of Japan’s most admired artistic exports during the Meiji and Taishō periods. A pair of three-foot floor vases, which were part of the estate, were sold 2.2 lakh.
19th-century Indian collectors were greatly attracted by Ming and early Qing prototypes, as evidenced by the lavishly decorated drawing rooms of the city’s elite. A similar painted vase, though of a different shape, is found in the collection of Dorabji Tata, which was inherited by the Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sanghalaya (CSMVS).
“Want to see a mysterious coincidence?” Chatterjee asked. “Both (Mangaldas and Tata vases) were pasted at exactly the same place,” he said, zooming in on the image of Tata’s vase from CSMVS on his phone screen. While the Nanking Crackleware from Mangaldas’s estate is still chipped, the Tata vase displayed in the museum has been restored.
Mangaldas’s sons, Tribhovandas and Purushottamdas, carried on his legacy, adding more properties to the estate and also building public facilities such as theatres. He was also an impeccable collector. The 17-inch metal mantel clock flanked by a turbaned horseman bears the imprint of renowned French inventor Jappy Frères, one of the leading makers of clock movements in the late 19th century. It was bought by a collector 1.2 lakh.
Sujan, a descendant of Purushottamdas, remembers her mother and aunts recounting stories of their ancestors. “They were very inquisitive people and studied science, mastered the English language, spoke Gujarati at home and had friends and acquaintances from all levels of society, caste and creed. I think this collection reflects this cosmopolitanism as well.”
