Incident Reports

Four kidnappers sentenced to jail

2015-12-16

Bagmati, Lalitpur, Lalitpur

Patan Appellate Court on Tuesday handed down its verdict on a controversial 2009 court ruling on two kidnapping cases which had led to four notorious criminals walking out on bail. This time the accused have been convicted with jail sentence up to eight years. Bhimsen Pandit, Rohit Paliwan Agrawal, Sanjaya Shrestha and Ram Shrestha, who were also involved in the highly publicised kidnapping case of Dr Bhaktaman Shrestha, then chief of BP Koirala Memorial Cancer Hospital in Bharatpur, were found guilty of abducting Binod Kumar Neupane on 17 December 2007 and Omkar Bhattachan on 6 January 2008. The quartet, already serving time–15 years each--for abducting Dr Bhaktaman, will now have to remain in prison for the crime that they had committed earlier. A division bench of Judges Dilli Raj Acharya and Lekhnath Ghimire announced the verdict against the four men. According to the court decision, Bhimsen and Rohit were sentenced to eight years in prison, and Sanjaya and Ram were handed down seven-year jail time. The decision has also warned government attorney to remain careful while filing cases of such intensity. The verdict has pointed out that the attorney has missed a provision under the Number 7 of Chapter 8A on Kidnapping/Abduction and Hostage Taking of Muluki Ain that requires additional two years of prison on top of pronounced sentence. The Clause 7 reads that “in cases where two or more persons kidnap/abduct another person or take hostage in a collective or organised manner, all the persons involved in such an act shall be liable to the punishment of imprisonment for a term of two years.” In 2009, Bhimsen, Rohit and Sanjaya were released on bail by Judge Tej Bahadur Karki of the Kathmandu District Court while prosecutors had sought three to seven years imprisonment for Rohit and three others. Following the release, they were involved in shooting of a person and later abducting Dr Bhaktaman. It was after this high-profile abduction and involvement of Bhimsen as mastermind that Judicial Council probed into the earlier decision and sacked Karki in 2011 when he was a judge at the Appellate Court in Hetauda. He was charged with moral impropriety and incompetence.

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