Eye-watering £260,000 for Gandhi specs
Crocked Cowell loses race to be fit for BGT finals
AUCTION Leader’s glasses
A PAIR of glasses once owned by Mahatma Gandhi sold for £260,000 at auction yesterday – 26 times their guide price.
The gold-coloured specs gifted to the current owner’s uncle in the 1920s were sold to a US collector.
Gandhi led the struggle for India’s independence from Britain. He is a hugely revered figure, who was assassinated in 1948.
Andrew Stowe, of East Bristol Auctions, said: “It’s a phenomenal result.”
He added: “These glasses have been lying in a drawer for the best part of 50 years. The vendor literally told me to throw them away if they were ‘no good’. Now he gets a lifechanging sum.”
A shawl worn by Gandhi sold in 2013 for £40,000.
COWELL FRIEND ON WHY HE WON’T BE APPEARING
Cowell on a ride in Malibu in April
Judges go wild during BGT auditions in March
SIMON Cowell will not appear in the finals of Britain’s Got Talent as he continues to recover after breaking his back when he fell from an electric bike.
The music mogul’s doctors have ordered him to stay put at his base in the US and not even appear via satellite link.
A pal said: “He just needs healing time. It was decided that having him judge the BGT finalists is not feasible or sensible.”
ITV bosses are now after a replacement judge for the Saturday night show, which records in two weeks’ time. Cowell, 60, whose production company makes BGT, had been keen to attend the UK finals. And last night it emerged that he still intends to swoop in and surprise contestants on America’s Got Talent in the next few weeks, before the series ends. Cowell’s accident, witnessed by his shocked partner Lauren Silverman, her son Adam and their shared son Eric, six, happened as he tried out a powerful Swind EB-01 electric bike in the courtyard of his Malibu home this month.
The e-bike, described by its British maker as “brutally fast”, can do up to 60mph. Cowell underwent a six-hour operation and had a metal rod inserted into his broken back.
He just needs time to heal. Having him judge was not sensible