Lalita Niwas land grab case: Attorney Office decides to file case only in forgery

A government document forgery case will be filed against those arrested in the Lalita Niwas land grab case.

The District Attorney Office, Kathmandu has decided to prosecute the case only in the forgery of government documents.

“It was decided not to file a charge sheet in organized crime. We are going to register the case only in the forgery of government documents,” an official at the District Attorney Office, Kathmandu said.

The Office has informed that a case against 290 persons has been filed at the District Court for forging government documents.

According to him, a case will not be filed against former prime minister duo Baburam Bhattarai and Madhav Nepal.

The Office has also decided to not make former election commission Sudhir Kumar Sah a defendant in the Lalita Niwas land grab case.

The Attorney’s office registered the case after studying the investigation report submitted by the Central Investigation Bureau of Nepal Police.

In the report prepared by the CIB, it has decided not to make former prime minister duo Bhattarai and Nepal defendants in the scam.

But the court had issued an order to bring the decision makers in the case under investigation.

The CIB had recorded the statements of Bhattarai and Nepal only a day before it submitted the report to the District Attorney Office.

Four years ago, a case was filed against the then prime ministers Madhav Nepal and Baburam Bhattarai in the Lalita Niwas land grab case.

The hearing of the case has not been held yet.

During the Madhav Kumar Nepal government, Bijay Kumar Gachhadar of the Nepali Congress served as a Minister of Physical Infrastructure and Deep Basnyat was the secretary at the ministry. It was during their tenure that they decided to fraudulently register plots of land in the names of numerous individuals and fake tenants.

The Nepal Cabinet had made a decision to expand the prime minister’s residence and construct a road within Lalita Niwas by compensating individuals who had illegally occupied the land. This agenda was brought by Gachhadar in the Cabinet. It has been found that the Nepal Cabinet made three different decisions in three separate meetings, providing an opportunity for the accused parties to engage in the scam.

All of the decisions were against the law. Several members in the Nepal Cabinet have stated that Lalita Niwas-related matters were never discussed during meetings, indicating the potential direct involvement of former prime minister Nepal.

The probe committee identifies Shova Kanta Dhakal and Ram Kumar Subedi as key individuals involved in the scam, labeling them as ‘land mafias’. From the early stages of the scam, these individuals have been implicated, as they still hold over 15 ropanis of Lalita Niwas land in their names, even after selling 30 ropanis of land to others.

The proprietor of Bhatbhateni Supermarket, Min Bahadur Gurung, and his family are owners of more than 29 ropanis of Lalita Niwas land. They acquired the land from Dhakal and Subedi. Furthermore, the duo also sold approximately five ropanis of land to former election commissioner Sudhir Kumar Shah.

When Bhattarai was prime minister, his Cabinet decided to transfer around three ropanis of land of Nepal government to ‘Pashupati Tinkinchha Guthi’ but the Trital-led committee had been unable to find about this Guthi. Neither the ministry officials nor the Guthi stakeholders know about the existence of this Guthi, raising suspicion against Bhattarai in the land grab case.