Two months after its first decision on appointment of chief of Nepal Police, which had run into controversy and quashed by the Supreme Court, the government on Monday appointed Deputy Inspector General Prakash Aryal to the post of inspector general.

A hours-long Cabinet meeting, which sat on Monday after a hiatus of three weeks, decided to pick Aryal from among four contenders—Aryal himself, Nawaraj Silwal, Bam Bahadur Bhandari and Jaya  Bahadur Chand—after reviewing the marks the four top officials had accumulated in the last four years based on their performance, qualification, seniority and prize among others.

According to Minister for Foreign Affairs Prakash Sharan Mahat, a four-member review team headed by Home Secretary Lok Darsan Regmi had reviewed the four DIGs’ work efficiency marks of the last four years as per the Supreme Court order. 

The members of the Regmi-led review team had Tanka Mani Sharma, secretary at the Prime Minister’s Office; Kamal Sali Ghimire, secretary at the Ministry of Law; and Acting Inspector General Dinesh Chandra Pokhrel as members. 

According to sources, the review team had found that Aryal had a score of 154, Silwal 152.4, Bhandari 150.2 and Chand had a score of 147 when their last four years’ work efficiency marks were counted. The Regmi-led team had then forwarded its report to the Cabinet. 

Aryal, who joined police force as inspector on April 11, 1988 was promoted to the post of DIG on December 19, 2012 along with Silwal, Chand and Bhandari. The government’s earlier decision of February 12 of appointing DIG Chand was challenged in the Supreme Court.

Responding to separate petitions filed by an advocate and DIG Silwal, one of the contenders for the post, against Chand’s appoint as the IG, the apex court on March 21 quashed the government decision of promoting him to the post of IG, saying that the government should take into account merit and seniority, as mentioned in Nepal Police Regulations, while promoting police officers.