Paintings worth Rs 200 crore were stolen from Air India's headquarters in Mumbai

Bad luck has struck Air India again after painting worth Rs 200 crore from its Mumbai headquarters were stolen Some of the missing paintings are by renowned artists like MF Husain and Jatin Das Air India is already under a debt of more than Rs 52,000 crore and will probably be privatised soon

Air India has been in the eye of the storm for the last few weeks. The hard-pressed airline that has been struggling against stiff competition has reported at least seven years of losses.   The Indian government decided to privatise the troubled national airline. And now bad luck has struck the airlines again after painting worth Rs 200 crore from Air India’s Mumbai headquarters were stolen.

Some of the missing paintings are by renowned artists like MF Husain and Jatin Das. 

The fact that the paintings had gone missing came to light after Jatin Das was contacted to verify a piece of work he had painted for Air India before its sale.

The paintings were kept in a hall in the Air India headquarters, where Air India authorities wanted to open a public museum. The collections included works by the biggest names in Indian art including Arpana Caur, Anjolie Ela Menon, B Prabha, KA Ara, MF Husain and V S Gaitonde according to Business Today.

Union Minister Jayant Sinha said, “We are monitoring the media reports very carefully. Air India has been keeping quite accurate records over the years and making sure that the entire inventory is properly accounted for.”

Air India recently came under fire when the passengers of flight AI 880 were left breathless and gasping for oxygen when it’s ACs started malfunctioning.

Air India is also under a debt of more than Rs 52,000 crore. While they were expecting another bailout package from the current government, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley has decided to sell it away.