The Scream by Edvard Munch, a Norwegian painter, remains to be one of the most popular pieces of art of the 20th century. Munch painted four versions of this iconic work in 1893 and this certainly gave thieves more options to steal. One version was stolen on February 12, 1994, from the National Art Museum in Oslo and it was stolen during an exhibition that was linked to the 1994 Lillehammer Olympics.
What is more interesting is that the thieves planned to return it. Out of good conscience? Of course not! They.demanded a $1 million ransom for its return. Another way to look at it is that The Scream was kidnapped. Norwegian authorities politely declined and conducted a sting operation with the assistance of British law enforcement.
The painting was fortunately recovered undamaged after two months, and the four perpetrators were imprisoned. Ten years after the first theft, another copy of The Scream was stolen, this time from the Munch Museum in Oslo. The thieves were arrested in May 2006, and the painting was recovered in August of that year. Although it had sustained some damage, authorities stated that their condition was better than expected.
This day marks another significant event that is relatively recent but holds great relevance today. On February 12, 2016, student leader Kanhaiya Kumar was arrested on sedition charges by the Delhi police at an anniversary event of the death of Afzal Guru, at Delhi's Jawaharlal Nehru University. The anniversary event was held on 9 February 2016 where some students of JNU held a protest on their campus against the capital punishment meted out to the 2001 Indian Parliament attack convict Afzal Guru.
Guru's case was controversial as during the crucial stage of his trial, he did not have enough legal representation, which is one of the points that was highlighted in the death anniversary events that the students had observed. The arrest of Kumar and subsequently his peers hit headlines for months and is still spoken of today. Kumar went on to serve as the National Executive Council member of the Communist Party of India. He recently shifted loyalties to the Indian National Congress.
