Police on Wednesday arrested Rakesh Agrawal, owner of Sarlahi-based Annapurna Sugar Mill, from his residence in Tripureshwor, on fraud charges.

Senior Superintendent Basanta Bahadur Kunwar, spokesperson for Nepal Police, said that a fraud case has been filed against Agrawal for not paying sugarcane farmers in Sarlahi and Nawalparasi.

[Read: Sugar mills are gradually clearing years-long dues, says government but farmers are not satisfied]

Agrawal is also the owner of the Nawalparasi-based Indira Sugar Mills.

“We have launched a formal investigation,” Kunwar told the Post.

According to the Ministry of Industry, Commerce and Supplies, Annapurna Sugar Mills has paid only Rs99.01 million out of the Rs170 million it owes to farmers, till now.

The Ministry of Home Affairs had on December 15 issued orders to arrest owners of the sugar mills if they fail to clear the dues to farmers.

[Read: Sugarcane farmer, who came to get his dues, dies of heart attack]

The Sugarcane Farmers Struggle Committee has announced a series of protests starting with a farmer awareness campaign slated to be held from January 23 as they say that the money owed to them has not been paid in full as promised.

Sugarcane farmers had travelled from the Tarai and gathered in the Capital from December 13 to protest for the second time demanding that their outstanding dues be cleared.

They called off their two-week-long protest on December 28 following an assurance from the government that the mills would pay them within 21 days.