The Kathmandu District Court has sentenced six workers of Nepal Student Union (NSU), the student wing of Nepali Congress, to two years in prison and fined them Rs 20,000 each for attacking Tribhuvan University Assistant Professor Prem Chalaune three years ago.
Judge Binod Khatiwada’s bench on Thursday jailed and fined six of the accused while it acquitted another accused, the court’s information officer Deepak Dahal told Setopati.
According to Dahal, the court sentenced NSU TU Committee President Hari Acharya and Secretary Yogendra Rawal, Sayuj Shrestha, Niraj Rana Magar, Rupesh Shah and Rabin Lama to two years while it gave a clean chit to Deepak Ojha.
The court has also ordered restitution of Rs 2,817,000, the total cost incurred during Chalaune's treatment, equally from the six.
Chalaune said that the court’s verdict had given him partial justice.
“They had attacked me with a plan to kill me. We had, therefore, pleaded that the offense of attempt to murder be established. The verdict of only two years’ imprisonment for battery has been given. This has given me partial justice. My demand is that they should be immediately jailed now,” he said.
The seven were accused of attacking Chalaune at TU on October 6, 2020.
A Cabinet meeting on June 13 had decided to withdraw the case of battery and attempt to murder filed against them. Chalaune had then moved the Supreme Court and also staged a hunger strike against the Cabinet decision. He had called off his hunger strike after the apex court issued an interim order to not implement the decision.
