The Kathmandu District Court has extended the custody of medical entrepreneur Durga Prasai by five days.
The court’s information officer Melish Baskota said that Judge Shyam Bihari Maurya on Wednesday granted the police permission to keep Prasai in custody and investigate him for five more days.
A complaint had been filed against Prasai accusing him of making offensive statements on social media and of character assassination.
The Kathmandu District Court had issued an arrest warrant against Prasai, Jeevan Pandey and Prakash Chandra Dahal last Wednesday.
A team from the Cyber Bureau arrested Prasai from his residence in Bhaktpur on Sunday afternoon. Later the same day, the Kathmandu District Court remanded him to custody for three days according to Section 47 of the Electronic Transactions Act.
On Monday, Prasai’s son Nirajan had filed a habeas corpus petition at the apex court seeking his release. Nirajan had named the Office of the Prime Minister and Council of Ministers, the Ministry of Home Affairs, and the Cyber Bureau of Nepal Police as defendants in the petition.
Responding to the petition on Tuesday, Justice Prakash Man Singh Raut’s bench refused to release Prasai. The court issued a show cause notice ordering the defendants to submit a written response within 15 days.
Prasai has been involved in many controversies and in the past has campaigned for non-payment of bank loans. He has also made disparaging remarks against students studying medicine in Bangladesh in the past and has levied outrageous allegations against leaders from many political parties.
Prasai’s bodyguards Deepak Khadka and Ram Kumar Dhimal were arrested from the Supreme Court premises in March when they were entering the court for a hearing related to Prasai. Along with the gun, police also recovered two small magazines, two big magazines, one magazine holder, and 100 rounds of bullet inside a black bag from the two.
They were later charged under the Arms and Ammunition Act.
