DHANGADHI: Youths smeared soot on Doti Education Development and Coordination Unit (EDCU) Chief Ananta Kumar Paudel accusing him of financial irregularities, on Sunday.

Paudel had returned to his office after monitoring the Secondary Education Examination (SEE) exams in the district when twelve youths barged in and smeared soot on him around 1:30 pm today.

Subsequently, Nepal Students Union (NSU) issued a press release stating Paudel's involvement in accepting 10 per cent commission while handing over a contract for reconstruction of the school building, construction of toilet, and accusing him of abuse of authority while hiring contract teachers, and accepting bribes.

Likewise, NSU has accused Paudel of embezzling temporary teacher's renewal fees, hiding the exact number of promoted teachers and recruiting chairperson of school education examination on the basis of political quota rather than merits.

Similarly, the statement signed by a former central member of NSU Bijaya Raj Ojha and other members today blamed Paudel of using Chandarmaya Koirala's and Arun Paudel's bank accounts to distribute funds to school principals. Along with the statement, NSU has attested Paudel's mobile SMS as evidence to his involvement in anomalies.

NSU also accused Paudel of misusing government vehicles on public holidays. As per the statement, Paudel has been acting on political prejudice and is negligent to problems facing schools.

"We repeatedly informed the issue to Chief District Officer Yadav Subedi but to no avail. It proves that this is a case of organised corruption in the district," NSU said in the statement.

With this press release, NSU has urged the media and civil society to create pressure to investigate into the financial irregularities and bring the culprits to book.

"Bijaya Raj Ojha had raised the issue relating to financial irregularities in teachers selection process. We held a discussion with both the parties. However, we are yet to come to a conclusion," CDO Subedi said referring to NSU press release adding no complaints were filed in the DAO instead.

Meanwhile, Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP) and DPO Spokesperson Lal Bahadur Dhami said police were also informed about today's incident after they received a nine-point statement issued by NSU.