Indian artist finds exhibition of his work full of fakes

India's art world is reeling from one of its most embarrassing forgery cases after S.H. Raza, one of the country's foremost artists, inaugurated an exhibition of his paintings in Delhi – only to discover that most were fakes.

Mr Raza, who is based in Paris, had contributed some drawings to the show at the Dhoomimal Gallery while the gallery had borrowed about 30 more paintings – supposedly his early works – from his nephew.

"When I reached the gallery and started looking at the canvases on the walls, I was stunned," Mr Raza wrote in an Indian newspaper.



"As I moved from one canvas to the other, I realised that the works were just not mine, they were all fakes," he said. "I will turn 86 next month. At this stage of my life, this was the last thing I wanted to do – grace an exhibition of my own fake paintings."

Mr Raza is one of India's most famous living artists and his works are in high demand internationally, with one painting selling for about £1.3 million at a Christie's auction in London last year.

Guests at the inauguration on Saturday night described how Mr Raza had quietly inspected the paintings, with his nephew and the gallery owners, before informing them that they were forgeries. Uday Jain and Uma Jain, the gallery owners, apologised to the veteran artist, saying that they had been duped, and cancelled the show half an hour later.