In her writ application filed at the Supreme Court on Wednesday, Shrestha has mentioned that the news report published on the daily on June 14 and the editorial column published on June 18 defamed and scandalised the court.   

On the front page of June 14 edition of Kantipur, Khadka had written a news report on the court’s decision to release Mohan Agrawal and Chinese national Guymtso Lama, the prime accused in a gold smuggling case, on ordinary bail, and to detain Om Bahadur Bajracharya, the taxi driver found transporting the contraband gold. The division bench of Justices Gopal Parajuli and Cholendra Shumsher Rana had also ordered Bajracharya to post a bail amount of Rs 1 million.     

Shrestha has claimed that the news report by Khadka violates the concept of independent judiciary, and she has accused the scribe of defaming the court’s verdict.

Similarly, making her case against Editor Sharma, Shrestha has mentioned in her writ application that the editorial column, published on June 18 about the proposed Bill on contempt of court titled Abhibyakti Swantantratamathi Prahar (An attack on freedom of expression), was written with the intent of influencing the proposed Bill.  

  The writ application says: “A series of articles published in Kantipur has forced justice providers to read the newspaper ahead of issuing the verdict, affecting the tasks of delivering free and fair justice.”  

The hearing on the case will take place on Friday, and it will be presided over by Justice Parajuli.