Lankan monks oppose move to auction Buddha relics

The monks want the relics to be handed over to India and made available for public veneration

- BY QUINTUS COLOMBAGE

(UCAN) Buddhist monks in Sri Lanka have urged the British government to help protect some ancient Buddhist relics that descendants of a colonial-era explorer have set for auction.

The relics — bone and ash believed to be the remains of the Buddha — and some jewelry were set to be sold in an auction in Hong Kong on May 7.

Sotheby's, the British-founded international brokers, suspended the auctions after India's cultural ministry issued a legal claim seeking to return them for "preservation and religious veneration."

Reports suggest that British explorer William Claxton Pepe excavated a burial site in India's Piprahwa village in 1898, where he found relics and about 1,800 pieces of jewelry, including pearls, gems, and gold.

The findings have never become part of any museum. Pepe family owned them, and his descendants now want to sell what they inherited.