श्रद्धांजली to the doyen of Museums : Sadashiv Gorakshkar.

Sadashiv Vasantrao Gorakshkar, a veteran and doyen in the field of museums in India - a recipient of the coveted Padma Shri award (2003), who spent more than five decades of his life working with the museums and art and culture institutions in different capacities, including as the Director of the coveted Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya (CSMVS), Mumbai - formerly the Prince of Wales Museum - as the Chairman of the Executive Committee of the Nehru Science Centre , Mumbai and a Member of the Governing body of NCSM, Kolkata, passed away at his residence in Vasind - a pristine location far away from the maddening crowd of Mumbai, which he had preferred - this morning. He was 86 years.

Born in the year 1933, Gorakshkar started his career in Museums as a Lecturer in the Department of Museology MS Baroda University before moving to Mumbai to start his innings with the Prince of Wales Museum (CSMVS), and his tryst with this famed museum ended in 1996, when he retired as the Director of the Museum. Among the museum professionals he mentored include Mr Sabyasachi Mukherjee, the current Director General of the CSMVS under whose leadership the museum has grown from strength to strength and is now counted among the best of Museums not just in India but globally and for this Gorakshkar also needs to be credited. There will be hardly few, particularly those in my age group and higher, in the museum community who may not have interacted with Gorakshkar ji and I am one of those who had the privilege and an opportunity to be associated with. He was very closely associated with our centre from its inception and worked in advisory capacity with the founding fathers of our Council, Dr Saroj Ghose and Mr RM Chakraborty during the formative period of NCSM.

He was one of the chief architects of the Oil and Natural Gas Museum, which was developed by our council, NCSM, on turn key basis at Dehradun. His passion for museums and exhibitions, notwithstanding his frail health, came to the fore when he visited the Uniting India : Sardar Patel exhibition (2016) at our centre and spent substantial amount of time, going through most of the exhibits and holding discussions on the exhibition. He served as one of the members of a committee constituted by the Ministry of Culture for submitting a report on the National Maritime Museum, and I had the honour to be the member secretary of this committee while I was the Director of the NGMA, Mumbai. He possessed Shastri like physical stature and also shared the strong character of Lal Bahudar Shastri ji.

Gorakshkar curated several exhibitions including Maritime Heritage of India to commemorate 250 years of Indian Naval Dockyard, Magnificent Obsession exhibition of the Karl Khandalvala collections, which eventually were graciously gifted by the family to the CSMVS, Lavanya Darpana exhibition in Sweden, Tibetan Art and Culture exhibition “Where Mountains are High and the Land is Pure”, which was opened by His Holiness DalaiLama. He was also involved in mounting some of the significant international exhibitions in countries like Bulgaria, Mauritius, Sweden, Japan. Gorakshkar had the honour to deliver prominent endowment and keynote addresses on various topics of art, history, museology and his publications include A Comprehensive Survey of Eastern India Bronzes, Lavanya Darpana (Mirror of Beauty) exhibition catalogue of the exhibition held in Sweden, Mriga exhibition catalogue held in Japan.

Gorakshkar had the honour to be the President, of the prestigious Commonwealth Association of Museums. He was closely associated with Indian Heritage Society, INTACH His last public assignment was as the Chairman, Archives Advisory Committee, Raj Bhavan, Mumbai. Gorakshkar is the recipient of several awards which include among others Tagore Fellowship, Jeevan Gaurav Purashkar - Chaturanga Prathishta, Sai Ratna Purashkar and the prestigious Padma Shri.

 
The mortal remains of Gorakshkar may have been engulfed by the divine flame during the last rites, which were paid to him by his family, friends and a large number of people including state Government representatives and the Police who joined in the state funeral, but then his services in the field of art, culture and museums will ever remain immortal. Rest in Peace Gorakshkar ji.

Sadashiv Gorakshkar image credit : Ganguly Biswarup, who has been passionately posting photographs on Wiki Commons for the benefit of public.

Last rites image credits Suhas Bahulkar ji.