Agent of Gandhi memorabilia flees Gujarat Vidyapeeth

Agent Peter Ruhe, in Ahmedabad to purchase Mahatma Gandhi’s photographs and memorabilia for sale in the international market, had to flee on Sunday.

After DNA reported that Ruhe had put up at the Gujarat Vidyapeeth guest house, the electronic media hounded him with uncomfortable questions about the purpose of his visit.
On Sunday morning, a huge group of media men cornered him at the guest house. Ruhe initially dismissed the DNA report as 90% wrong. But when media persons persisted, he packed his bags and decided to drive out of the campus in an autorickshaw. He was shivering with fear and kept telling the rickshaw driver “chalo, chalo”. The calm and composure he had displayed while speaking to DNA reporters on Saturday had been replaced by sweat and stammer. He even forgot to pay the hostel dues and was soon chased down by vidyapeeth employees.

They wanted him to return to the hostel office and pay Rs1,000 for his two-day stay. The agitated Ruhe alighted from the rickshaw, shelled out the money, sought a receipt and began walking out of the campus.

At this point, he was again surrounded by the media and forced to speak. He said, “I am not a dealer, I am acting on behalf of people who want to sell their material. I am just a facilitator… they approach me… I don’t approach them... so you should question their intentions, not mine.”

Ruhe invoked the Indian Copyright Act and also referred to Mahatma Gandhi’s idea of self-sufficiency to justify the sale of his memorabilia.