BAHAWALPUR, Feb 14: A majority of 23 legal heirs of the late Nawab Sir Sadiq Muhammad Khan Abbasi have agreed to auction what the implementation committee headed by Justice Qadeerudin Chaudhry (retired) calls valuable antiques at the sealed Sadiqgarh Palace in Dera Nawab Sahib, just to expose tall claims of the government which has been custodian of the palace for the last 37 years.

Some insiders who attended the recent meeting of the implementation committee told Dawn here on Saturday that although they knew that no valuable would be found on desealing the palace on Monday, they had agreed to committee's suggestion just to continue the process of distribution of other rural and urban properties of the late Nawab among them.

Many of them claimed that they knew about thefts, robberies and mysterious disappearances of antiques from the palace over the past 37 years. If on desealing the palace, it was found that there were no antiques and valuables, they could exert pressure on the government to compensate them or investigate the disappearance of valuables. They added that on many occasions, police had registered cases and apprehended the culprits, but the latter enjoyed the support of some influential people of the area.

A descendant of a legal heir said on the condition of anonymity that if the antiques were found missing, the heirs might jointly take action against the government and its commissions set up from time to time for distribution of properties of their ancestors.