Birgunj, November 20

Two Nepali Congress leaders got into a fight in Birgunj today.

NC’s Provincial Assembly member from Parsa Om Prakash Sharma, and NC Birgunj metropolis town committee Chair Bhola Kalawar scuffled over the issue of rent for the town hall in Bablu Tea Stall in Adarshanagar, Birgunj.

Kalwar had leased the hall for 20 years last year, by pledging to pay 100,000 in rent to the metropolis annually. Sharma, however, had been protesting the deal all along, accusing Kalawar of securing the hall at a ‘ridiculously’ low rent by unduly influencing the metropolis staff.

He argued that leasing out the hall to someone for a long time would mean loss to the state.

According to eye-witnesses, as the argument over the issue got intense the two leaders came to fisticuffs. Normally injured in the scuffle, the leaders were then admitted to Narayani Hospital for treatment. While Sharma has returned home following treatment, Kalawar, who is a chronic blood pressure patient, has been sent to Kathmandu for further treatment because problems seen in relation to his health.

On his part, Sharma claimed that he was verbally abused by Kalawar in public today, and many a time in the past, over the issue and was beaten up by hired goons. “Today itself, we had a brief exchange of words over tea in the morning. But while I was still at the tea shop, I was beaten up by goons that he had called from Chapkaiya and Shreesiya,” Sharma said, also lamenting the belated arrival of police.

The police, however, said they had moved as soon as they were informed about the dispute between the leaders at the tea shop. “It’s not true that police reached the site late. In fact, we had mobilised the police as soon as we had got information about the dispute,” said Parsa District Police Office SP Somendra Singh Rathaur, adding that police were serious about managing security and peace.

Parsa Chief District Officer Narayan Prasad said police had started investigating the incident.