The Commission for the Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA) filed a second corruption case against former Prime Minister and CPN co-chair Madhav Kumar Nepal at the Special Court on Tuesday, naming former minister Minendra Rijal and 97 others in connection with a cabinet decision made in 2066 BS. The case concerns a government decision over land and Rijal Tashi Industries in Itahari, Sunsari, when Nepal was prime minister.
Case concerns a cabinet decision
The CIAA’s filing places a decision made by Nepal’s cabinet at the centre of the case. According to the information provided about the filing, the matter relates to land and Rijal Tashi Industries in Itahari. The commission has named Nepal, Rijal and 97 other people in the case.
The available details do not specify the land’s area, the terms of the cabinet decision, or the individual roles attributed to the people named. Nor do they set out the alleged loss or benefit linked to the decision. Those details are important to understanding the claims, but cannot be established from the information released in the reports linked here. The case should therefore be understood as an allegation brought before the court, not as a finding of guilt.
Nepal and Rijal among those named
Nepal was prime minister when the cabinet decision was made in 2066 BS. Rijal, identified in the case as a former minister, is also among the defendants. The reports say that 97 others were named alongside them, but the information available here does not identify those individuals or explain their respective positions in relation to the land decision.
This is the second corruption case filed against Nepal, according to the case announcement. The summary of the filing does not provide details of the first case, including its subject or procedural status, so no comparison between the two cases can be made on the basis of the information available.
Proceedings at the Special Court
The CIAA filed the case at the Special Court, the institution where the matter has now been presented. The filing marks the start of court proceedings on the commission’s allegations; it does not, by itself, establish whether the defendants committed an offence. The available reports do not give details about the next hearing, the claims sought by the commission, or any response from Nepal, Rijal or the other people named.
The case links a cabinet decision from 2066 BS to land and an industry in Itahari, Sunsari. However, the reports’ available summaries do not explain how the decision was implemented, what specific conduct the commission challenges, or how responsibility is divided among the defendants. Further information from the case filing or court proceedings would be needed to clarify those questions.
The filing was reported by Nepal Press and Pradesh Khabar. As the case proceeds, the court process will determine how the allegations are addressed. Until then, the named individuals remain accused in a case concerning the cabinet’s land-related decision, rather than having been found guilty.
