Kathmandu, March 3

Gyanendra Jha,  who accused Shubha Narayan Pathak, brother of former commissioner of the Commission for the Investigation of Abuse of Authority Raj Narayan Pathak, of forcing him to  work as a mule to hand over bribe money to Raj Narayan,  recorded his statement at the CIAA today.

This is the second day that he has recorded his statement at the anti-graft body, which has been probing corruption allegation against Raj Narayan.

Raj Narayan resigned from his post on February 15 in the face of corruption allegation against him.

Jha has said that he was coerced  into collecting   Rs 7.8 million bribe money from Lambodar Neupane, one of the board members of Bhaktapur-based  Engineering College, and to hand over the amount to former CIAA commissioner Raj Narayan.

Jha said CIAA officials asked him how he got involved in the case, who gave how much money to whom and when. “All the questions were related to audio visual details that we have submitted to the government,” Jha said, adding that the anti-graft body had all those details which he submitted to the government.

Jha had assigned Dhwajman Muktan, an acclaimed Karate player to carry out a sting operation against Raj Narayan. In one of the sting operation videos, Raj Narayan admits to taking bribe (from Neupane).  He said CIAA officials behaved in a gentle manner during the questioning that went for four-and-a-half hours. Jha was asked to clarify about the sequence of his four/five phone conversations with Raj Narayan which he had recorded. “Raj Narayan named some big leaders and high profile police and government officials in the conversations and he also used vague references  so CIAA officials wanted to know the sequence of events and the meaning of Raj Narayan’s conversations,” Jha said, adding that in one of the conversations he told Raj Narayan that Neupane wanted his money back if he could not settle his case to which  Raj Narayan told him not to ignore him.

Raj Narayan’s conversations with Jha are in Maithili language.

Jha said he found CIAA officials very serious about the case. “I think Raj Narayan will certainly be quizzed by the CIAA now,” he added.

Jha said he felt so bad that a CIAA commissioner who was supposed to devote his effort to root out corruption was himself involved in corruption and that’s why he decided to expose him by recording his conversation with him and assigning Muktan to carry out the sting operation against Raj Narayan.

“Now I hear people say that both bribe giver and bribe taker and those who carries out sting operation should be punished but if a citizen who is punished in such a situation, then nobody would ever dare to expose corruption,” Jha added.

Jha said he apprised the government and the CIAA that he faced threat from Raj Narayan and the government. Jha will have to record his statement on Tuesday again.

Mobile phones of Raj Narayan and Lambodar Neupane remain switched off ever since corruption allegations surfaced against Raj Narayan in the media.