Former Maoist lawmaker Bal Krishna Dhungel and eight others killed Ujjain Kumar Shrestha of Okhaldhunga district in cold blood on June 24th, 1998. That much is beyond doubt. With all the evidence arrayed against the nine accused, the Okhaldhunga District Court had in 2004 convicted them of murder. Then, in 2010, the Supreme Court upheld the verdict of the district court and sentenced Dhungel, the mastermind of the 1998 murder, to life imprisonment.

Dhungel would then have been nabbed by the police were it not for a recommendation for his 'presidential pardon' by the Baburam Bhattarai government. Six years later, the Supreme Court on Thursday quashed Bhattarai's recommendation—and rightly so. In doing so, the court's Constitutional Bench, comprised of four senior-most Supreme Court judges and Chief Justice Kalyan Shrestha, has clearly stated that Dhungel does not qualify for amnesty as Dhungel, after his conviction, chose to abscond rather than turn himself into the police. Predictably, the verdict has created ripples in Maoist circles as Maoist leaders fear that they too could be implicated in one or the other conflict-era case.

It should have never come to this. The Interim Constitution of 2007 had envisioned the formation of transitional justice bodies within six months. It took seven years for the two bodies—The Truth and Reconciliation Commission and the Commission on Enforced Disappearances—to come into being. Had they been formed on time, most conflict-time cases would perhaps have been settled by now. The long delay has been arduous for the thousands of families whose loved ones had either been killed or made to 'disappear' during the 10 years of the Maoist insurgency.

Sadly, nearly a year after the formation of the twin bodies, there has been no progress in investigating war-time cases of killings, rights abuse and disappearances. And this is why the Maoist leaders, now spread among different parties, are spooked every time there is a conviction of one of their own in a court of law. But we don't see any cause for panic. Dhungel and his helpers murdered Ujjain Shrestha owing to a family feud that had nothing to do with the Maoist party. This is why it was dealt with as a purely criminal case from the start. Moreover, there is no legal provision of filing cases retrospectively. So new cases cannot be brought against any of the Maoist leaders or members of security forces who were active during the war.

The Maoists made the mistake of trying to protect Dhungel, a cold-blooded murderer because he too was a Maoist. We hope that they will not repeat their mistake. They should, if anything, be helping expose criminals in their midst like Dhungel who are giving the whole Maoist movement a bad name. We would also like to urge the government to expedite the works of the two transitional justice bodies. Ujjain's family is getting a semblance of closure, 18 years after his brutal murder. But thousands of other families continue their seemingly interminable wait for justice.