Kathmandu, February 18

Attorney General Agni Prasad Kharel today submitted his office’s annual report to President Bidhya Devi Bhandari stating that overall his office was successful in securing conviction in 84.50 per cent cases.

OAG Spokesperson Sanjib Raj Regmi told THT that his office was able to increase the conviction rate by almost 6 per cent in the fiscal 2017-18. According to a press release issued by the OAG, the government filed 29,230 cases in fiscal 2017-18 fiscal against 58,539 defendants.

The OAG filed cases listed in the schedules of the Government Case Act, 1992 and it filed 1,282 cases that were not listed in the schedules (mostly serious criminal offences).

It filed 13,985 public offence cases, the highest so far. The OAG filed 2,186 rape cases, 2,875 cases related to drug abuse and 586 polygamy cases.

The OAG said it investigated   40,597 incidents of crime this fiscal of which were 39,315 incidents of crime were listed in the schedule and 1,282 were other crimes.

OAG and its subordinate offices have 80,077 cases and writ petitions to defend.

The number of cases in which government attorneys defended the government was 65,527 cases, a jump by 7.57 per cent. In the current fiscal, 10,242 writ petitions and 4,308 petitions were filed against the government. The OAG said there was 65 per cent increase in the last five years in cases represented by government attorneys.

The OAG said it had been facing staff and resources crunch due to increase in the number of cases.  It said additional training opportunities should be made available for government attorneys on the provisions of the new penal code.

AG office offered legal opinion in 87 cases out of 102 in which the opinion of the AG was sought.