Sunitha Sajeev has been collecting coins without realising their value
until she got a chance to exhibit her collection at Mal Lawal exhibition.
By Umer Nangiana
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In her personal collection, she has coins such as Napoleon Emperor Vampire Francisco Centime 55, 1855, the Travancorean One Chuckram coins of Maharajah Bala Rama Varma II and a half Anna (currency) issued by East India Company, Bombay Presidency of India from 1844 to 1861.
And she has more than 50 such precious coins in her collection of over 300 pieces of rare currency, mostly coins. Unaware of their true value, Sunitha Sajeev, an Indian expatriate, has been keeping such treasure to herself until she got a chance to exhibit her collection at the ongoing Mal Lawal showcase at Doha Exhibition Centre (DEC).
She has exhibited once before at this event, one of the biggest showcases of private collections, but Sunitha was not aware of her collection’s worth. “I exhibited last time as well but at that time I did not have this much of collection and I did not know the value of some of them. But this time, I got a coin collector, an expert, so he told me that these are the precious ones,” Sunitha told Community.
She said an expert from Qatar Museums (QM) went through some of her collection and approved that these were rare coins. In her personal collection, she has amassed coins from all over the world.
Sunitha has categorised the collection according to areas such as Arab, Asian, European, African and American collections. Some of the rare coins were the ones used by the princely territories of erstwhile Kerala. She keeps all of them in her personal collection and does not intend to sell any of them, though most of them offer great value.
A part of her collection is the one handed to her from her father. It was he who inspired her to start collecting coins. “He actually started collecting and when I was child he started giving me the coins. Then I started collecting coins on my own. It was like 10 years ago that I seriously started collecting them,” said Sunitha.
When she was 10, her father used to give her coins, almost every day. However, these were the recent ones and she started keeping them in her piggy bank, this was how she developed interest in coins in the first place. She then went on to gather the rare ones that attracted her.
Interestingly, Sunitha has never purchased any coins. “I find them mostly through my friends, acquaintances and relatives. Whenever I travel I collect it from them. I never buy coins. This is all given to me by family and friends since they know I collect them,” she said.
Sunitha has more than 300 coins. Some of them are very recent Arabic collections. She does have a few currency notes. She maintains an album of her collection from which she plucked a few to exhibit at Mal Lawal.
Sunitha is an Executive Assistant to the Director of Museum, QM, and joined the organisation in 2007. She is a BCom graduate from All Saints College, Trivandrum, with an additional post-graduate diploma in computer applications. A native of Kottayam, Kerala, she in fact studied in various places due to her father’s frequent transfers as he was a bank employee.
Travelling affected her studies, but it allowed her on the other hand to see many places, to interact with people, imbibe art and culture. This helped her to follow her passion of collecting coins from her friends and relatives from various places.
“Actually, I began my hobby irrespective of the value of the coin. Each one with a different colour and shape was an excitement for me. My father was my inspiration. He used to give me coins whenever he found any fancy ones,” said Sunitha.
After her marriage, she came to Doha and has been living here for the last 15 years. She believes Qatar is like her second home.
She has volunteered at the opening of the prestigious projects such as Museum of Islamic Art (MIA) and the first Doha International Film festival where she got to meet famous personalities such as filmmaker Meera Nair and the late painter M F Husain from India.
She believes her interest in collecting coins led her to a job in Museums. She thanked QM for conducting the Mal Lawal Exhibition and giving her an opportunity to exhibit there. Some of her precious collections include one quarter (1/4) anna coin, Queen Victoria 1890, Government of India, One Rupee rare coin from 1950, Jawaharlal Nehru, One Indian Rupee one from 1889-1964 and 1/4 Anna issued by Bombay Presidency, India, 1833.