Surat businessman bids Rs 1.48 crore for Narendra Modi's suit

SURAT: Bidding for Prime Minister Narendra Modi's pin-striped bandhgala suit intensified today with a Surat-based diamond trader offering Rs 1.48 crore, upping his earlier stake by Rs nine lakh and eclipsing the bid of Rs 1.41 crore of a Bhavnagar businessman.

Surat-based Mukesh Patel enhanced his bid to Rs 1.48 crore from Rs 1.39 crore he had offered earlier. The fresh offer outstrips by Rs 7 lakh the Rs 1.41 crore bid by Bhavnagar-based Ship-breaker Komalkant Sharma, CMD of Leela Group of Companies.

Made on the penultimate day of the three-day auction, Patel's bid is the biggest so far, Rs 27 lakh more than yesterday's highest of Rs 1.21 crore by textile trader Rajesh Juneja. Earlier in the day, Global Modi Fan Club's Rajesh Maheshwari, also from Surat, had made a bid of Rs 1.25 crore.

There were four other bids of less than Rs 1.21 crore for the suit which Modi had worn during his meeting with the US President Barack Obama.

As the monogrammed bandhgala, which according to some reports is worth Rs 10 lakh, hogged all the limelight at the auction, initially there were few takers for the humble Cricket Australia T-shirt gifted to Modi by bowling great Brett Lee which attracted bids ranging between Rs 1500 and Rs 2000.

However, towards the evening a BJP MLA from Surat and a city-based businessman made two separate bids of Rs 1.11 lakh each for the football world cup jersey and cricket Australia T-shirt gifted to Modi.

Harsh Sanghvi, MLA from Surat's Majura assembly seat, said he will donate the FIFA World Cup T-shirt to a team of blind sportspersons if he won the bid.

"I have made a bid of Rs 1,11,111 for the FIFA T-shirt that was gifted to Prime minister Modi during his visit to Brazil after football World Cup last year as I want to donate it some blind people's team either of cricket or football," Sanghvi told PTI.

"I have preferred the sport T-shirt over other items as I am young and want to encourage the youth of my constituency who are pursuing a career in sports. This will surely encourage them," added Sanghvi.