HONG KONG — Remember the lucky Chinese herdsman who recently stumbled onto a 17-pound gold nugget? Well, it seems China’s government hasn’t forgotten, as the nugget’s finder may now be forced to surrender his find to the state as a public “mineral resource.”

After the ethnic Kazak herdsman accidentally tripped over a gold nugget “on bare ground” in China’s far western Xinjiang region about two weeks ago, the local government conducted an appraisal of the rock — and an investigation with various officials to discuss ownership of the treasure, the government-run Beijing Morning Post reported Wednesday.

News that the gold might be seized has triggered controversy across China, with legal experts and laypersons alike debating who should get to keep the giant nugget.

The local cultural heritage authority has already admitted the nugget isn’t a “cultural relic” — which would automatically make it a state asset — referring to it instead as a “mineral product,” a separate report by the state-run Xinhua Daily Telegraph said earlier this week.

However, the report quoted a lawyer based in Shanxi province as saying that if the nugget is eventually determined to be any type of “mineral resource,” it would still be the property of the government under Chinese law.

Some other law experts disagree, however.

Cheng Jianwei, a lawyer in the northwestern city of Xining, said that since the nugget was sitting uncovered on the ground rather than buried below the surface, the discovery would be outside the legal definition of “inspecting and recovering mining resources,” according to the Beijing Morning Post report.

Likewise, China University of Political Science and Law professor Li Xiandong told the newspaper that the circumstances of the find show the nugget is “an ownerless thing,” which should belong to the herdsman.

The report said that if the state does take the gold, the herdsman’s outlook for compensation might be dim, noting that in 2011, a farmer found a priceless Neolithic stone ax while digging on his land but received a mere 100 yuan ($16) in reward after authorities took possession of it.

This article originally appeared on Marketwatch.