Nepali Congress (NC) central member and former home minister Bal Krishna Khand, an accused in the fake Bhutanese refugees scam, has been released from the Central Jail.
According to Assistant Jailer Mitra Luitel told Setopati that Khand was taken to the Kathmandu District Court, and then to the Department of Money Laundering Investigation, after he was released from prison on Friday afternoon.
Khand will later be taken to the Commission for the Investigation of Abuse of Authority at Tangal, after which he will be released on date.
On Thursday, a bench of Judge Krishna Ram Koirala ordered the release of Khand on a bail of Rs 3 million. Khand was released after his relatives submitted a bank guarantee equal to the bail amount on Friday.
The joint bench of judges Janak Pandey and Prakash Kharel on December 1 had differed on whether to release Khand on bail or not.
While Pandey had opined that Khand be released on a bail of Rs 3 million Kharel stated that he should be kept in custody.
The joint bench hearing different petitions filed by 20 defendants against the Kathmandu District Court’s order to send them to judicial custody had ordered release of exiled pro-democracy Bhutanese leader Tek Nath Rizal on a bail of Rs 1.50 million. Rizal is still in jail unable to pay the bail amount.
The bench, however, had ordered that CPN-UML leader Top Bahadur Rayamajhi be kept in judicial custody along with former secretary Tek Narayan Pandey, Sanu Bhandari and Keshav Dulal.
Similarly, Khand’s personal secretary Narendra KC and president of Nepal Hajj Committee Shamsher Miya had been ordered to be released on a bail of Rs 1 million each, Rayamajhi’s son Sandeep on Rs 3 million and Ram Sharan KC on Rs 1.50 million.
The bench had also released Laxmi Maharjan and Ashish Budhathoki on date. The Kathmandu District Court had earlier ordered her release on a bail of Rs 500,000.
The District Government Attorney’s Office (DGAO), Kathmandu, has made 30 individuals defendants in the case. Twenty of them have already been arrested while 10 others are still at large. The DGAO had filed cases of fraud, organized crime, forgery and offense against the state against them on May 24 on the basis of the investigation report submitted by the police.
The Kathmandu District Court had ordered to send 17 of them to judicial custody and released three on bail.
The 20 defendants then moved the Patan High Court against the Kathmandu District Court’s order.
