Deputy parliamentary party leader of Nepali Congress (NC) Bijay Kumar Gachchhadar has said the Commission for Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA) has not summoned him for statement in relation to the Baluwatar land grab.
He took exception to reports that he has absconded and claimed that he went abroad for eye treatment. Organizing a press conference at the Tribhuvan International Airport upon his arrival on Monday, he conceded that he took the proposal for expansion of the prime minister's official residence in Baluwatar to the Cabinet on behalf of the Ministry of Physical Infrastructure and Planning.
He claimed that the proposal was taken completing due procedures.
He refuted reports that the constitutional anti-graft body is looking for him and added that he will cooperate if the CIAA calls him for statement.
The probe committee formed by the government under former secretary Sharada Prasad Trital has called the Cabinet decision illegal and recommended its 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.
CPN General Secretary Bishnu Paudel has also been dragged in the scam as eight annas of grabbed land (plot number 309 and 3015) has been transferred to his son from Uma Dhakal and Madhavi Subedi, wives of Shobha Kanta Dhakal and Ram Prasad Subedi identified as land mafia by the Trital committee.
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 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
