Mahatma Gandhi glasses sold for £39,780

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Mahatma Gandhi’s round steel-rimmed spectacles were sold for a record £39,780 at an auction Tuesday by specialist Mullock’s in Ludlow, Shropshire. They were expected to fetch £10,000-£15,000.

The glasses, kept in original metal case corroded with age but with the original felt bearing the name H. Cannam Optician 23, St. Aldate Street Gloucester, were bought by Bapu when he was a student in England in the 1890s.

The identity of the buyer was, however, not disclosed.

Mahatma’s wooden charkha, which he used during a visit to London for the second Round Table Conference in 1931, fetched the second-highest price of £30,420, double the estimate of £10,000-£15,000.

However, soil from the site of Gandhiji’s assassination did not sell for the price estimated — between £10,000 and £15,000 — and was sold for £11,700.