British Prime Minister David Cameron Refuses India's Koh-i-Noor Diamond Demand

LONDON (July 29) -- For Britain, it's a glittering memento of the might and majesty of the Victorian Empire; to India, a reminder of centuries of colonial oppression and cruelty. Now the 106-carat Koh-i-noor diamond is at the heart of a diplomatic spat that could mar British Prime Minister David Cameron's attempts to build closer ties with the subcontinent.

The gem -- believed to have been unearthed in southeast India a least 800 years ago and once believed to be the world's largest diamond -- has been in British hands for 160 years, after the 11-year-old Maharaja of Punjab presented it as a gift for Queen Victoria. The boy king didn't want to hand it over, though: His army had been defeated by the British East India Company and, as part of the Treaty of Lahore, the Sikh monarch was ordered to surrender his family's prize jewels.

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The Koh-i-noor, or "Mountain of Light," diamond was last worn by the late Queen Mother and was displayed on top of her crown when her coffin lay in state after her death in 2002.

The stone was a whopping 186-carats when it first landed in England. But after it failed to wow audiences at the 1851 Great Exhibition in London -- the stolen treasure stubbornly refused to shine, possibly due to its unusual shape -- Victoria's consort Prince Albert ordered the diamond to be cut down to its current size, so increasing its brilliance.

However, Albert never dared wear the jewel, being familiar with an old Indian legend that warned, "He who owns this diamond will own the world, but will also know all its misfortunes. Only God or Woman can wear it with impunity." And so the lump of regal bling was slotted first into a tiara for Queen Victoria, alongside some 2,000 other diamonds, and later made the centerpiece of crown worn by the Queen Mother at the coronation of her husband, King George VI, in 1937. The Koh-i-noor -- which means "Mountain of Light" in Persian -- was last seen in public in 2002, when it was placed on the Queen Mother's coffin as her funeral procession passed though central London.

Now, though, an increasingly confident and economically powerful India wants its former ruler to hand back the prize -- a gesture that would prove Britain at last considers India to be its equal. Last year, Tushar Gandhi, great-grandson of independence leader Mahatma Gandhi, said the Koh-i-noor should be returned as "atonement for the colonial past." And just before Cameron's arrival in India on Wednesday, Keith Vaz, an opposition British MP of Kenyan-Indian descent, renewed that demand, telling The Times of India: "It would be very fitting for the Koh-i-noor to return to the country in which it was mined so soon after the diamond jubilee of the Indian republic and 161 years after its removal from India."

But during an appearance on India's NDTV channel today, Cameron -- who is in the country to boost Anglo-Indian trade -- politely refused to relinquish the crown jewel. "What tends to happen with these questions is that if you say yes to one you suddenly find the British Museum will be emptied," he said. "I know there is also a great argument about the original provenance of the Koh-i-noor diamond. I'm afraid this will disappoint viewers, but it's going to have to stay put."

Cameron was clearly thinking of other artifacts snatched during Britain's glory years -- such as the Elgin Marbles, torn off the walls of Athens' Acropolis at the turn of the 19th century, and Egypt's Rosetta Stone -- which are also wanted by their original owners.

But some British experts aren't so sure that India has a compelling case. "The crucial thing is this diamond has been in circulation certainly since the beginning of the 16th century during which time it has been in the hands of whole sequence of different rulers," historian Anna Keay of English Heritage told BBC radio this morning, noting past owners variously lived in what is now modern-day India, Pakistan, Iran and Afghanistan. "The question is: To which point do you take it back?"

And other groups believe they have greater historical rights to the diamond than the current claimant. In 2000, the Taliban demanded the Koh-i-noor be sent to Afghanistan "as soon as possible" so that it could be displayed in Kabul's bomb-damaged central museum. "The history of the diamond shows it was taken from us to India, and from there to Britain," Taliban spokesman Faiz Ahmad Faiz told The Guardian. "We have a much better claim than the Indians."