India, Nov. 4 -- Sabyasachi Mukherjee, director general of Mumbai's Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya (CSMVS), often finds himself at the museum's Buddhist gallery. "I come here when I am stressed. I find solace and strength looking at this statue," he says, pointing towards a beautiful terracotta Buddha from the 5th Century BC.

This sculpture was deposited in the museum's collection, then called the Prince of Wales Museum, in 1911, even before its building was ready in 1914. The Buddha, along with 312 other priceless objects, sculptures, decorative terracotta tiles and reliefs, travelled to Mumbai all the way from the archaeological mound of Kahu-jo-daro, a Buddhist stupa in Sindh, Pakistan, which has since been flattened....