Tyeb Mehta's 'Rickshaw Puller' fetches record 69 crore

In 2002, a Tyeb Mehta triptych aptly titled Celebration, from The Times of India collection, set off quite a party in the Indian art market when it became the first Indian painting to cross the crore mark at auction. Though it came in the winter of his life, it was a remarkable milestone for an artist who had spent much of his life in a cramped one-room Bombay apartment that doubled as a studio by day and a bedroom at night. Since that landmark sale, prices for Mehta's paintings, including those featuring his signature bulls, have bull-dozed many old records. The latest is Rickshaw Puller, which fetched Rs 69.1 crore at Volte Una's inaugural auction, setting a world auction record for the artist. The sale surpassed Mehta's earlier personal high of Rs 61.8 crore, set by Trussed Bull in April 2025.