CPN General Secretary Bishnu Paudel, who has been implicated in Baluwatar land grab, has claimed he will never betray the trust of people.
Addressing a program organized in his constituency in Butwal of Rupandehi on Sunday he urged cadres to not believe the rumors spread about him. "Bishnu Paudel is not someone who will sell your integrity, and trust," he claimed.
Pointing that he has passed the test of people of Rupandehi, he assured that he will not do anything that will make the people bow their head in shame, and allow others to do so. "I will move forward respecting the mandate you have given. There will be no compromise on that."
Paudel has been dragged in the encroachment of government land in Baluwatar with eight annas of the grabbed land transferred in the name of his son Navin.
Some CPN leaders citing the then prime minister Madhav Kumar Nepal have told Setopati that Paudel facilitated Cabinet decisions to provide grounds for the land grab and had even arranged donation of Rs 40 million to the party in return for the decisions.
The probe committee formed by the government under former secretary Sharada Prasad Trital has called the Cabinet decisions illegal and recommended their revocation.
The committee had submitted the report to the government in December 2018 concluding that the land transferred to individuals belonged to the government.
The committee had advised the government to ask the Central Investigation Bureau (CIB) of Nepal Police to investigate how ownership of the land was transferred to individuals and investigate the state of such government land across the country.
The committee stated that the then king Mahendra after the coup in 1961 had confiscated 14 ropanis land of Nepali Congress leader Suvarna Shumsher Rana and his father Kanchan Shumsher in Baluwatar. The government four years later acquired 285 ropanis of Rana's land in Baluwatar by paying compensation.
The PM's residence, chief justice's residence, speaker's residence and the central office of Nepal Rastra Bank are currently situated in 172 ropanis out of that 285 ropanis.
Land mafia in connivance with staffers at the Land Revenue Office has transferred ownership of the remaining 113 ropanis of land to different individuals, the committee has concluded. The land owned by Paudel is out of that 113 ropanis.
