Kathmandu, July 17

Patan High Court yesterday convicted three individuals of human trafficking.

The court slapped 20-year jail sentence and Rs 2 lakh fine on each of Shyam Lal Dangol, Gyanendra Chanahara and Sunita Murmur, holding them guilty of trafficking Sisne Himal (name changed), a resident of Rolpa. The court also decided that the three convicts should pay Rs 2 lakh each to the victim as compensation, according to the court’s Registrar Baburam Dahal.

Earlier, the Kathmandu district court had slapped Dangol, the kingpin, with 10-year jail sentence and Rs 50,000 fine. The district court had acquitted Chanahara and Murmur.

However, a division bench of judges Yagya Raj Bhatta and Tek Narayan Kunwar of the high court held all three guilty.

Meanwhile, Patan High Court has struck down Nuwakot District Court’s decision to impose a jail sentence of 37 years and six months and a fine of Rs 250,000 on Nuwakot resident Sun Bahadur Tamang.

Nuwakot District Court had imposed the sentence on Tamang holding him guilty of human trafficking seven years ago.

Tamang, who was sent to jail in 2018, can now walk free.

Patan High Court, however, endorsed Nuwakot District Court’s decision to impose 30-year jail sentence on another accused, Tikaram Tamang, according to Patan High Court Registrar Baburam Dahal.

Sun Bahadur Tamang, was elected Ward Chair of Dupcheshwar Rural Municipality of Nuwakot on Nepali Congress’ ticket.

The decision to acquit Tamang was passed by a division bench of judges Ramesh Bahadur Thapa and Hari Pratap KC.

“This court decides to acquit Tamang as the Nuwakot District Court’s conviction verdict passed on March 21, 2018 was not right,” the high court stated in its order. Police had accused him of running brothels across India.

According to Deputy Attorney Buddhi Lal Shrestha, Nuwakot District Court had imposed 20-year jail sentence on Sun Bahadur Tamang for trafficking a woman, 10 years for transporting her from one place to another place and seven years and six months for trafficking another victim.

He said the victim who had lodged FIR with Nuwakot police had said that Tikaram Tamang and Sun Bahadur Tamang sold her into a brothel in Mumbai but later when she recorded her statement in the court, she did not name Sun Bahadur Tamang as an accused.

Shrestha said the government would file an appeal against the Patan High Court’s acquittal verdict.