Tasmayee Laha Roy Moneycontrol News
The bids began from Rs 20,000 and in less than 24 hours it shot up to Rs 2.5 crore. No! It isn’t for an artefact. It is for Akshay Kumar’s naval uniform from his hit movie Rustom.
The auction is being conducted by SaltScout, a fund-raising platform based in Mumbai. Proceeds from the auction will go for animal rescue work done by Janice's Trust NGO in Panchgani.
SaltScout thought of helping out the needy by selling the used costumes of the Bollywood stars but never imagined the pace of bidding. Interestingly, the auction will be up for a month.
With the rise in luxury spending, the list of most expensive items sold at auctions is also rapidly growing. Used celebrity clothing is perhaps one of them in India now.
It copies the international trend. Just a fortnight ago, Hollywood actor Russell Crowe made $3.7 million (Rs 24.67 crore) in five hours by selling some of his personal memorabilia at a Sotheby’s Australia auction.
Crowe had marked his wedding anniversary with former wife and his 54th birthday with the auction, and called it ‘The Art of Divorce’.
Strong khiladi
But it seems that Bollywood’s Khiladi has started off at a breakneck pace when compared to the Gladiator.
While it took 200 items from Crowe’s personal belongings to fetch around Rs 24 crore in five hours, Akshay’s uniform upped the ante with just a piece of used clothing.
“We just started with Akshay Kumar and the moment he and Twinkle Khanna (Akshay's wife) tweeted about the item, we started getting heavy traffic on our site. Interestingly most queries and highest bids came from smaller cities like Bharatpur and others,” said Komal Hiranandani, founder at SaltScout. Actors, directors and production houses have committed to help SaltScout in raising funds for a cause.
Hiranandani, a development economist by training, started SaltScout a month back with the goal of making socially conscious spending more mainstream.
Studying the trend of the bids, Hiranandani said, “Looks like fans from the smaller cities are bidding the most to get a piece of their favourite stars who they can never reach.”
However, the auctions do not end with Akshay Kumar’s costume. Next on the block is Anushka Sharma’s kurta that she wore in The Breakup Song from the movie Ae Dil Hai Mushkil, Hrithik’s superhero jacket from Krrish, Sonam Kapoor's Khoobsurat outfit and a shirt that was worn by Ranbir Kapoor in the movie Yeh Jawaani Hai Deewani.
Anushka Sharma’s kurta would go first in a week’s time and the rest would follow a week apart from each other. Most of these items would have a base price of Rs 10,000 barring the Krrish jacket that would take off at Rs 20,000 just like Akshay’s costume.
While the charities SaltScout is associated with would soon see a windfall gain, thanks to the e-auction, Hiranandani would keep a 10 percent cut from the proceeds for the upkeep of the platform.
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