The Special Court on Tuesday acquitted three incumbent and former officials of the Pashupati Area Development Trust in a corruption case for alleged misuse of gold while laying the peethikakavach, a gold sheet covering for the base of the main Shivalinga at the Pashupatinath Temple.

Peethikakavach gathers and channels liquid offerings like water and milk made to the Shivalinga.

A bench of Special Court chair Tek Narayan Kunwar and member Murari Babu Shrestha cleared member secretary (suspended) Milan Kumar Thapa, who was then treasurer at the Trust, the then member secretary Pradeep Dhakal and storekeeper Arun Kumar Shrestha of charges.

On October 1, the Commission for Investigation of Abuse of Authority filed a case accusing them of misappropriating 1.491kg of gold valued at Rs11.70 million in the course of installing the peethikakavach. The amount was fixed based on the market price of gold on February 11, 2021, when it was purchased.

In January 2021, the then prime minister KP Sharma Oli had announced to provide Rs300 million to the temple to install the gold peethikakavach and the Ministry of Culture accordingly released the money.

On February 11, 2021, the Trust had purchased 103.773 kg of gold from the Nepal Rastra Bank for the purpose. The purchased gold contained pure gold weighing as much as 102.614kg.

According to the CIAA, after deducting impurities weighing 73.88 grams, it found the actual amount of pure gold used in peethikakavach came to 101.048 kg. And, the anti-graft body sued them for the missing 1.491 kg.

The CIAA had blamed the then member secretary Dhakal and then treasurer Thapa, who was also the coordinator of the peethikakavach installation committee, for their failure to protect the gold in their custody. The anti-graft body had also accused them of handing over the task of making the ornamental covering to people who had little expertise in the craft.

In the chargesheet, the anti-graft body, citing the then co-treasurer of the Trust, Basudev Rimal, had claimed that at 11 pm on February 23, 2021, the accused officials prepared a report attesting to the presence of a total of 109.76 kg of gold including small amounts of other metals like copper and tin that were mixed with the gold to make it harder. Their report also said the peethikakavach weighing 96.822kg, barring the gold band and a few gold nails, was installed on the Shivalinga, according to the chargesheet.

The CIAA had charged Dhakal and Thapa of taking out the gold from the safe box at the Trust’s store on March 4, 2021, without documentation, and providing a portion to the Silver Rolling Service to prepare the gold band for the Shivalinga.

Storekeeper Shrestha was accused of dereliction of duty for allowing Dhakal and Thapa to take away the gold without documentation.