KATHMANDU, July 31

The police have nabbed the managing director and a director of now defunct Lalitpur-based Unity Life International that had swindled tens of millions of rupees from its unsuspecting clients.

A special team led by DSP Sudip Pathak of the Metropolitan Police Crime Division apprehended Bishnu Bahadur Chhetri, 42, and Krishna Bahadur Chhetri, 47, of Arthar Dandakharka of Parbat from Gaddachauki of Kanchanpur yesterday, Metropolitan Police Commissioner AIGP Bigyan Raj Sharma said. They are siblings and had been absconding since May 10, 2010.

Bishnu was ULI managing director while Krishna used to work as training director for ULI.

Nepal Police had issued an Interpol Red Corner Notice against them on January 16, 2012, for their arrest. Lalitpur District Court had sentenced Chhetri brothers to three years in jail and slapped a fine of Rs 25.52 million on each of them as per its verdict of March 31, 2014.

Though police officially claimed that the duo were held from Kanchanpur, undercover cops who were deployed to tack down the convicts said the Chhetri brothers were nabbed from a rural area of Uttarakhand, where they were found to be operating a fish farm. Last week, Krishna had uploaded a photo of a body on his Facebook account, claiming ‘it was the body of his younger brother Bishnu, who was shot dead by an unidentified gang at an undisclosed place’ to mislead the people and law enforcement agencies. “Based on the rumour, police launched a technical investigation to find their whereabouts,” an official said. SSP Sarbendra Khanal, MPCD in-charge, had mobilised a special team of undercover cops to apprehend them.

Crackdown on ULI was launched after the Supreme Court observed on May 23, 2010, that banking, insurance and cooperative businesses carried out by the controversial ULI were illegal. Following the court order, an arrest warrant was issued against ULI promoters and others associated with them.

ULI — a pyramid-style network scheme — had a total of 366,342 identified members across the country and abroad, and it had collected Rs 3.79 billion from them. However, it distributed only Rs 1.63 billion to the clients as commission and invested the depositors’ money in hospitals and real state. Chhetri brothers will be handed over to the court for the execution of the verdict, officials said.