Tagore's letters fetch Rs 5.9 crore at recent auction

AstaGuru Auction House’s Collectors’ Choice auction in late June witnessed remarkable results for two rare and historically significant offerings by Nobel Laureate Rabindranath Tagore, reaffirming his enduring legacy and cultural resonance.

Lot no 5 was an archive of 35 handwritten letters, with 14 envelopes, that Tagore wrote to sociologist Dhurjati Prasad Mukerji. The lot fetched Rs 5.9 crore at the auction. The development is significant because the lot was not a visual artwork but a manuscript-based archive, and yet it fetched the second-highest price ever for a Tagore creation at auction.

Written between 1927 and 1936, Tagore’s letters offered deep insight into the poet's creative evolution, philosophical reflections, and transition from literary to visual expression.

“These letters go beyond the realm of literary exchange; they trace the artist’s inner landscape as he negotiates creative exhaustion, intellectual solitude, political disillusionment, and a decisive shift from poetry to painting,” Manoj Mansukhani, CMO, AstaGuru Auction House, tells Forbes India.

Twelve of the letters are written on distinct letterheads from places such as Santiniketan, Darjeeling, and aboard his houseboat Padma, visually chronicling Tagore’s geographic and intellectual journey. “This archive, more than any previously auctioned, reveals Tagore not only as a thinker and poet but also as a man in transition, confronting the shifting tides of his legacy,” adds Mansukhani

Many of Tagore’s belongings are archived at Visva-Bharati University, Santiniketan, the university which he founded in 1921, and where he lived for many years. His belongings and documents are also preserved at his ancestral home in Jorasanko, Kolkata. Rabindra Bhavana, the museum at the university has preserved hundreds of documents, including his Bengali and English correspondence, books, and sketches.

“Unlike the international auction landscape, where letters and personal memorabilia appear frequently, Indian auctions see fewer such offerings,” explains Mansukhani. “This is partly due to the private nature of such collections, many of which remain in family hands or are legally protected under heritage laws.”