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🇳🇵 Nepal /Elections & Politics

How pressure from the prime minister’s office is accelerating the passport investigation

From Kathmandu Post · () English

Summarized and contextualized by DistantNews.

At a glance

News Named sources Outcome reported
  • Officials from Nepal's anti-graft body met with the Prime Minister's secretariat regarding an active passport procurement investigation.
  • The Prime Minister's advisors pressed the Commission for the Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA) to accelerate the probe and arrest the Department of Passports Director General.
  • The CIAA officials explained procedural delays, but the advisors insisted on immediate action, leading to the on-the-spot arrest of the Director General and another official.

Officials from Nepal's Commission for the Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA) faced unusual pressure from the Prime Minister's secretariat in mid-June. Chief Secretary Suman Aryal coordinated a meeting at Singha Durbar, where CIAA Chief Commissioner Prem Kumar Rai and senior officials were summoned to discuss an ongoing investigation into irregularities in passport procurement.

We spent from office hours until evening at the PMO, facing questions from the PM’s advisors.

— CIAA officialDescribing the pressure exerted by the Prime Minister's advisors during the meeting.

The CIAA leadership debated the appropriateness of explaining an active investigation to the executive branch but ultimately attended the meeting. For several hours, advisors and aides to Prime Minister Balendra Shah, including Kumar Byanjankar and Asim Shah, pressed the anti-graft body to expedite the probe and arrest Tirtha Raj Aryal, the Director General of the Department of Passports. Aryal himself had also been summoned to the Prime Minister's office that day.

Commissioner Rai explained that the complaint was filed a year prior, a related case was pending in court, and procedural factors had caused delays. However, the Prime Minister's advisors remained insistent on immediate action. Even the presence of three additional CIAA commissioners, brought in to reinforce the body's position and explain constitutional boundaries, did not sway the advisors.

After the commissioners arrived and tried to explain the investigation and the constitutional boundaries involved, the PM’s advisers did not want to listen.

— CIAA officialHighlighting the advisors' refusal to consider the CIAA's explanations.

By evening, the advisors demanded the investigation begin immediately. Tirtha Raj Aryal was served an emergency arrest warrant on the spot and taken into custody. Sunil Kumar KC, director of the department, was also arrested shortly after. In the following days, Tula Prasad Acharya, a former accounts officer, and Manindra Malla, the Nepali representative for one of the German contractors, were also arrested. The Special Court later extended the detention of all four individuals.

begin the investigation “today, right here.”

— PM's advisersThe demand made to CIAA officials for immediate action during the meeting.
DistantNews Editorial

Originally published by Kathmandu Post. Summarized and contextualized by our editorial team with added local perspective. Read our editorial standards.

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