#MeToo: Sotheby’s India MD quits

NEW DELHI: Gaurav Bhatia has resigned as Sotheby’s India MD, nearly a month after he went on a “leave of absence” following allegations of sexual misconduct, the auction house said on Saturday.
Bhatia, who was the South Asia operations head and the “driving force” behind ‘Boundless: India’, Sotheby’s maiden auction in the country, put in his papers on December 20, 2018.Bhatia, in a statement, said he had decided to “move on” after two successful years with the auction house.
According to the anonymous allegations against Bhatia that surfaced on social media, he touched ‘victims’ inappropriately and forcibly tried to kiss them. Bhatia was among the big names that were called out in the Me Too movement in the Indian art world, besides leading artists like Jatin Das, Riyas Komu and most recently Subodh Gupta.