How and to what extent planned exploitation of government property is taking place in this loottantra era, the Lalita Niwas land scam is an example. Just the surface of the scam is also an example that how one partner revolted when he was discarded form the share on the exploited land.
First of all, the plan was developed by a team even by including the land owners and by creating fake Mohee (farmers). In the second phase, political leaders were used to influence the prime minister and the cabinet members and high ranking decision making level officers. They all were given assurance of equal share on land after capturing the government property.
In the meantime, one member in the team, known to be a private advocate, was ousted after he wasn’t given his share on captured land. The very advocate, who had every details and photocopy of all the documents, played the key role to expose this big scam. Otherwise, the Land Registration Office staffers, who were also in the team, had already destroyed the master copy of the document in the process of destroying evidences. Finally the advocate became successful in exposing such a big land scam.
CIAA’s partiality
After nearly one year long investigation, the Commission for Investigation on Abuse of Authorities (CIAA) has filed a corruption case against 175 individuals including former DPM and sitting MP Bijaya Kumar Gachhadar and two other former ministers at the High Court.
It is not odd that Bishnu Poudel or the then prime ministers Madhav Nepal and Baburam Bhattarai or Supreme Court’s sitting justice Kumar Regmi were innocent or not involved in the scam. So far, CIAA seems sympathetic towards them as they are in the ruling party or closed to the ruling party.
To escape from the scam, Bishnu Poudel’s son Nabin and Kumar Regmi have quietly returned the land they had owned inside the Lalita Niwas to the government. The Minister for Land Reform had herself instructed the Land Registration Office in Dillibazar to transfer the land owned by them to the government.
Along with Gachhadar, two former land reforms ministers Dambar Shrestha and Chandra Dev Joshi are also facing corruption charges over the Lalita Niwas scam.
Along with filing of a corruption case, Gachhadar, vice president of the NC, has been suspended from the Federal Parliament as MP.
Accordingly, several high ranking decision making level officers, including former CIAA chief Deep Basnet are also facing corruption charges in the court on Lalita Niwas land scam.
Reproduced by People’s Review
