By Our Reporter
The implication of high-profile leaders of the main political parties in the scam to swindle millions with a promise to send Nepali citizens to America as fake Bhutanese refugees have been rocking the country for the past few days.
At the same time, when news reports about the involvement of powerful politicians like Arzu Rana and Bal Krishna Khand of the Nepali Congress are making headlines, there has been a fear whether the case related to the refugee scam will be dismissed without carrying out any further investigation and punishing the criminals. Lawmakers in the parliament have been frequently raising their voices to investigate not only the fake refugee issue but other issues like the cantonment scam.
Nepali Congress (NC) leader and former Home Minister Bal Krishna Khand, his wife and NC lawmaker Manju Khand and NC lawmaker Arzu Rana Deuba—wife of NC President Sher Bahadur Deuba—have, of late, been dragged in the scam.
**********************************************************************************************
Fake Bhutanese refugee scam: NC leader and ex-home minister Khand arrested
Kathmandu, 10 May: Nepali Congress top brass leader and former home minister Balkrishna Khand has been arrested by the Police today.
Khand’s personal secretary Narendra KC is also arrested.
The Police are taking a statement from Khand and preparing to present him at the District Court today.
Ex-minister Khand, his wife Manju and ex-prime minister Sher Bahadur Deuba’s spouse are also alleged for being involved in receiving cash from innocent Nepalis for sending them to the US guise in Bhutanese Refugees.
************************************************************************************************
However, former Deputy Prime Minister and Energy Minister and CPN-UML Secretary Top Bahadur Rayamajhi is the highest profile person implicated in the case. The former Maoist leader has been on the run after the issuance of an arrest warrant. CPN-UML chair KP Sharma Oli has been blamed for hiding Rayamajhai from the police as well as trying to divert the case by demanding an investigation into other scams.
A total of 113,307 Bhutanese refugees were reported to have resettled in America, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Denmark, Norway, Britain, Netherlands and other countries by 2019.
A few Bhutanese refugees still remained in Nepal despite the third-country resettlement programme, and the Home Ministry formed a task force under the then Joint Secretary Bal Krishna Panthi through a minister-level decision on June 13, 2019 to study the status of the Bhutanese refugees staying in Nepal and make recommendation for their third-country resettlement. CPN-UML Vice-chairman Ram Bahadur Thapa was the home minister while current Chief of the Commission for Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA) Prem Bahadur Rai was the home secretary.
The report prepared by the Panthi-led task force identified 429 Bhutanese refugees authenticated by the UNHCR. The police are now preparing to question Panthi after questions have been raised that a few fake refugees may have been included even in that list.
The racket has been found to have added Nepali citizens by including sub-categories (a) and (b) in Schedule 9 in that report.
The Kathmandu Valley Crime Investigation Office has claimed that the racket had been active since 2019 to swindle Nepali citizens by promising to send them to America as fake Bhutanese refugees.
The investigation has shown that the task force was formed on initiation of that racket and fake refugees were included in its report. Chairman of the then Mahankal Rural Municipality in Lalitpur Ganesh KC, with no known expertise about refugee affairs, was included in that task force as an expert.
The racket swindled over Rs 136.30 million from 81 persons, as per the different complaints filed with the police, at the rate of Rs 1.5-2 million per person. The number of complainants has increased after the scam was made public.
The police initiated an investigation into the scam after victims Gajendra Budhathoki and Ram Kumar Regmi complained on June 1, 2022.
The police have arrested 10 persons as of Tuesday.
NC leader Sujata Koirala’s former personal secretary Keshav Dulal, Sanu Bhandari, Tanka Man Gurung, advisor to former home minister Ram Bahadur Thapa, Indrajit Rai, former home secretary Tek Narayan Pandey, son of CPN-UML Secretary Top Bahadur Rayamajhi, Sandeep Rayamajhi, Sandesh Sharma and Sagar Rai have already been arrested while Ramsharan KC and Govinda Chaudhary who played the role of middlemen in the case were arrested on Tuesday.
Arrest warrants have also been issued in the names of Top Bahadur Rayamajhi, Ram Bahadur Thapa’s son Prateek Thapa, Indrajit Rai’s son Niraj and others. They are currently absconding.
Keshav Dulal, Sanu Bhandari, Tanka Gurung, Sandesh Sharma and Sagar Rai are the main accused in the case, and the police have initiated an investigation into the involvement of top political leadership and senior Home Ministry officials based on their statements.
An audio recording submitted to the police by a complainant claims that Arzu and Manju Khand were also paid in the scam.
The police are investigating the involvement of former home minister Khand.
Former Nepal Police AIG Bigyan Raj Sharma has accused Khand of helping in the release of two persons arrested in connection to the scam. The Khands and Arzu have all denied involvement in the scam.
Login to add a comment