Kathmandu, January 3

The agitating four district FAs under All Nepal Football Association today accused the football governing body of embezzling one million rupees during the AFC U-16 Women’s Championship Qualifiers held here in September last year.

Issuing a press release, the presidents of four FAs — Birat Jung Shahi (Kathmandu), Purushottam Thapa (Lalitpur), Gautam Sujakhu (Bhaktapur) and Deepak Khatiwada (Dhading) — said ANFA staff Rajesh Shrestha handed over the amount of Rs 960,138 to Treasurer Rabindra Man Joshi instead of depositing into the ANFA account. They claimed the money was provided by Hotel View Bhrikuti, where the players were stationed during the tournament.

“ANFA had internal agreements with different hotels. The ANFA sent the bill with higher rates to AFC and the hotels later returned the money to the football governing body,” the release added. “But in this case, Grand Hotel Kathmandu has deposited the amount into the bank account of ANFA, whereas ANFA staff Shrestha withdrew the amount — issued via cheque number 0006045575 — from Satdobato branch of Sunrise Bank and handed that over the Treasurer Joshi,” it claimed.

The group also claimed ANFA President Karma Tsering Sherpa was aware about the matter. “A certain portion of that amount was paid to Hotel View Bhrikuti to clear the expenses incurred during the elections, while the remaining amount was shared among the ANFA officials,” the four presidents claimed.

Also, the agitating group accused the ANFA of booking Hotel View Bhrikuti rooms for different rates for two events in the space of two weeks. “The hotel rooms were booked for $78 during the AFC U-16 Women’s Championship Qualifiers held from September 9-13, while the same rooms were hired for $45 for the SAFF U-15 Championship held from October 25 to November 3. “The ANFA has clearly betrayed the AFC and it is an act of defaming the nation,” the release added.

The same group had accused the ANFA President Sherpa and his Change ANFA

group of electoral fraud making public

an audiotape, apart from influencing election committee and judiciary, and taking the voters to various parts of India before the elections. Similarly, they also accused Sherpa and his close aide Pankaj Bikram Nembang of passing death threats to the election committee members.