The Commission for the Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA) filed a fresh corruption case against former executive director of the National Information Technology Centre (NITC) Sunil Paudel and four others, alleging serious irregularities in a 2019 procurement of IT equipment.

The case, filed at the Special Court on Monday, seeks to recover Rs579 million in losses allegedly caused to the state.

Also named in the indictment are Ramesh Pokharel (then assistant director), Ramsharan Gayak (computer engineer), Nim Bahadur Wali (accounts officer), and Akbar Husain, CEO of Max International Pvt Ltd—the private company that supplied the equipment in question.

According to the CIAA’s charge sheet, the defendants colluded to manipulate the procurement process for RISC and Hyper-Converged Infrastructure (HCI) servers under IFB No. NITC/G/NCB-6-075/076, violating procurement norms in various ways.

They allegedly bypassed the mandatory public procurement procedures, prepared flawed cost estimates, structured the bidding to match predetermined technical specifications, and approved inflated prices under separate headings for training, installation, configuration, and warranty support.

The CIAA claims the actual value of the equipment was significantly lower than what was paid, as verified against publicly available datasheets.

It further found that payments were made for services such as onsite warranty and installation support, which were never delivered, and were in fact already the supplier’s contractual responsibility.

Max International was paid Rs2.65 million excluding VAT for training and installation, and an additional Rs3.14 million excluding VAT for a three-year warranty with onsite support.

The CIAA alleges these amounts were fraudulently extracted through collusion between NITC officials and the supplier.

The investigation also revealed that BancTec Pte Ltd, a Singapore-based supplier affiliated with Max International, had transferred US$79,640 to Paudel’s personal UOB Singapore bank account in 2019—suggesting possible kickbacks.

Paudel is already serving a nine-year sentence handed down by the Special Court in May 2024 for corruption in a separate case involving the procurement of Nepal’s National Payment Gateway system. That project, worth Rs250 million, was approved without adequate planning or infrastructure, causing further loss to the state.

In that earlier case, Paudel was fined Rs230 million and ordered to repay the misappropriated amount. He was convicted under Section 17 of the Prevention of Corruption Act 2002 and is currently imprisoned at Dillibazar Jail.

In the current case, the CIAA has invoked multiple provisions of Nepal’s Prevention of Corruption Act, 2002. Paudel faces additional prison time, fines equivalent to the financial damage, and asset recovery.

The charge sheet specifies that Paudel, in his role as NITC executive director, deliberately abused his authority to benefit personally and inflict loss on the state coffers. The CIAA has also demanded enhanced sentencing under Section 24 of the Corruption Prevention Act, citing his official capacity.