KATHMANDU, JULY 2

The Commission for the Investigation of Abuse of Authority has filed a chargesheet at the Special Court against six persons, including former acting chief of Agricultural Development Office, Mugu, for their involvement in corruption through financial embezzlement.

Those charged by the anti-graft body are former acting chief of Agriculture Development Office of Mugu Panchalal Budha, sub-engineer Rajendra Shahi and technical assistant Tek Bahadur Khatri, and office-bearers of local user committee Hasta Bahadur Rokaya, Amana Kumari Rokaya and Bhuwan Rawal.

According to the CIAA, they had embezzled Rs 1.28 million on the pretext of constructing an agricultural irrigation project in Gugiyachaur of ward No 4 during the fiscal 2019- 20. The amount was provided by the provincial government to the Agriculture Development Office to construct the irrigation project through the local user committee.

'However, Budha and other employees of the ADO misappropriated the project amount in collusion with the office-bearers of the local user committee without completing the project,' read a press release issued by the CIAA.

Though the project was still incomplete, Budha and other employees of the ADO had disbursed the amount to the local user committee by preparing and approving a project completion report for sharing the amount among themselves. 'They also mentioned in the report the works they had never carried out under the project and mentioned such works in the site measurement book and technical report,' said the anti-graft body.

The CIAA had launched a thorough investigation into the case after it received a complaint of corruption. The involvement of district-based government offices and local levels in corruption in collusion with local user committee are often reported by the CIAA in recent times. The defendants of this corruption case have been charged under the Prevention of Corruption Act, 2002. In the charge sheet filed at the court, the anti-graft body has demanded maximum punishment against them, including jail sentence, recovery of embezzled amount and fine equivalent to the amount in question.

A version of this article appears in the print on July 3, 2023, of The Himalayan Times.