Police have arrested Vijay Bahadur Yadav, former minister for land management, agriculture and cooperatives of Lumbini province, on the charge of banking fraud.

According to Deputy Superintended of Police Shyamu Aryal, the former provincial minister was arrested from Duduwa Rural Municipality of Banke on Sunday.

Aryal said Yadav is being brought to Rupandehi for further action.

A court had issued an arrest warrant against Yadav in a fraud case after a bank refused to pay for a check bearing Rs1.2 million to Uma Shankar Yadav of Siyari Rural Municipality of Rupandehi for lack of sufficient balance in the bank account.

Vijay served as the minister after he was elected to the provincial assembly from Banke-2 (a) from the Janata Samajbadi Party in the 2017 elections.

The party later expelled him on the charge of working against the party. He then entered the CPN-UML ahead of last year’s polls and contested the elections. But was defeated by Bhandari Lal Ahir of the Janata Samajbadi Party.