JSP-N MP’s abduction case a hot potato

Kathmandu, April 28

The Kathmandu District Government Attorney Office has also refused to register complaint against ruling Nepal Communist Party (NCP) lawmakers Mahesh Basnet and Krishna Kumar Shrestha and former inspector general of Nepal Police Sarbendra Khanal.

Leaders of the newly formed Janata Samajwadi Party–Nepal had reached the district attorney’s office in Babarmahal to file a complaint of ‘abduction’ of their fellow lawmaker Surendra Yadav allegedly by the trio.

A few days ago on April 26, Metropolitan Police Range, Teku, had also refused to lodge a first information report against the two lawmakers and Khanal, stating ‘the case did not fall under their jurisdiction’.

Top leaders of the party today pleaded with chief of Kathmandu district’s Government Attorney Office, Hari Prasad Regmi, to register their complaint but he turned a deaf ear towards them.

Rajendra Mahato, a senior leader of the JSP-N, said, “Today we went to seek justice from legal experts after we were failed by the police.  But, we did not get justice even from them.” He added, “It shows how rule of law is dying in the country while arbitrary rule and totalitarian system is flourishing.”

However, District Attorney Regmi, refuted the allegation that he refused to register the case, saying, “I had just a few days to study the case, gather prima facie evidence and make sure whether or not the case could be registered.” He added that, “Petitioners have left a copy of their complaint, which we will study for a few days and act accordingly.”

In the draft of the FIR, top leaders of JSP-N, including former prime minister Baburam Bhattarai, Hisila Yami, Upendra Yadav, Rajendra Shrestha and Rajendra Mahato, had accused the trio (Basnet, Shrestha and Khanal ) of forcibly bringing him from his house in Mahottari district on April 23 and holding him hostage at Marriot Hotel in Kathmandu. The accused, however, have been insisting that they had gone to Mahottari on the request of some lawmaker close to Yadav and that Yadav travelled to Kathmandu with them on his own will.

A version of this article appears in e-paper on April 29, 2020, of The Himalayan Times.

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