The Land Revenue Office, Kathmandu has issued a public notice stating that it could not find the home/address of those accused of the Baluwatar land grab.
The Land Reform and Revenue Department, Dilli Bazar publishing a 21-day notice on Gorkhapatra Sunday has said residence of those accused in the grabbing of public land.
The notice points that the home/address of 49 accused including promoter of Bhatbhateni Super Market Min Bahadur Gurung, Ram Kumar Subedi, Shovakanta Dhakal and others could not be found by staffers of the land revenue offices concerned who went to hand over the letter/notice to the accused to transfer ownership of the grabbed land back to the government.
The office has issued the public notice giving the accused 21 days, excluding the time for transportation, to report to the office if there is any reason to not transfer ownership of the land to the government
It has asked them to submit their response through dillibazar@dolma.gov.np if they cannot appear in person due to the current prohibitory orders.
The probe committee formed by the government under former secretary Sharada Prasad Trital had submitted the report to the government in December 2018 concluding that the land transferred to individuals in Baluwatar belonged to the government.
The committee's report stated that the government land inside Lalita Residence reached to different individuals due to Cabinet decisions under many prime ministers. It had recommended that the land should be taken back by revoking a few of those Cabinet 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 concluded.
