These are some of the best stories from The Kathmandu Post (February 7, 2020). Felling of trees to make way for the airport in Nijgadh has been controversial as the government itself does not have exact figures. Keshav Thapa/TKP
Some of the big stories from today's The Kathmandu Post.
Anti-graft body’s corruption charges called into question for being politically motivated
The Commission for Investigation of Abuse of Authority has indicted 175 individuals over the Lalita Niwas land grab but a number of key people have been passed over, raising questions among legal experts and former bureaucrats over whether the anti-graft agency’s intentions were politically motivated.
The commission had filed corruption cases against several individuals, including three former ministers, but stopped short of indicting Nabin Poudel, son of Nepal Communist Party (NCP) General Secretary Bishnu Poudel, and Supreme Court Justice Kumar Regmi, on the grounds that they have agreed to return the plots of land they own in a prime location in Baluwatar, known as Lalita Niwas.
Home Minister misled Parliament over extrajudicial killing of Kumar Paudel
With the Home Ministry’s directive to the Nepal Police to take action against those involved in the extrajudicial killing of Kumar Paudel, the Sarlahi district in-charge of the Netra Bikram Chand-led Communist Party of Nepal, questions are now being raised about the numerous times Home Minister Ram Bahadur Thapa has misled Parliament.
While briefing lawmakers on July 9, amid demands from the opposition parties to form a parliamentary panel to probe Paudel’s killing, Thapa had said that the Chand party member died in a police encounter. He had claimed that Paudel was killed when police opened fire in retaliation. Paudel was killed on June 20 in Lalbandi, Sarlahi district.
At Aryaghat, ‘Ghat doctors’ witness deathbed wishes
When doctors said Parbati Maya Balami had no chance of recovering from pneumonia, her son took her to the Pashupati Aryaghat for her last rites. The 89-year-old from Nuwakot was kept at the Pashupati Aryaghat Sewa Kendra, a white three-storey building above the Brahmanal. Upon examining her pulse, Suvarna Baidya, Pashupati’s ‘ghat doctor’ and the founder of the Sewa Kendra, said she would last two more days.
But he was wrong. Fourteen days after she arrived at Pashupati, a nurse at the ghat said that her son came to see her, and told her that her grandson had been married, and that he had laid the foundation of a new house in Thamel.
How many trees needed to make way for Nijgadh? Ministry orders fresh count to settle issue
The Ministry of Forest and Environment has finally ordered a survey to determine the exact number of trees required to be felled for the construction of the Nijgadh International Airport.
The government-commissioned Environment and Social Impact Assessment (ESIA) report, submitted in February 2017, said 2.4 million trees spread over 8045.79 hectares need to be cleared to make way for the new airport. But after the report’s credibility was questioned by environmentalists ‘for failing to meet minimum standards’ and ‘copy-pasting’ from an ESIA of a hydropower project, uncertainty loomed over the number of trees required to be removed.
Families of labourers who lost their lives on the job in Parbat await compensation
Kamal Rai, a technician deployed at a construction site of the Mid Hill Highway, died on September 23 last year when a mud mound collapsed on him. A resident of Belbari in Morang, had come into contact with his employer, Lama Constructions, when he was an engineering student.
He started working with the project as a sub-engineer while also pursuing his engineering degree.
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