Kathmandu, January 15
Lokman Singh Karki, former chief commissioner of Nepal’s anti-corruption body CIAA, left for New Delhi on Sunday morning with his wife, multiple sources said.
He left for the Indian capital on a flight of national flag carrier, Nepal Airlines.
According to multiple sources, Karki was accompanied by his wife Sunita, and the couple’s flight took off from Kathmandu’s Tribhuvan International Airport at 9:05 am. He is learnt to be planning to head to Canada, where is son lives.
Karki’s departure came just days after the Supreme Court fired him as chief of Nepal’s constitutional anti-corruption watchdog, deeming him ineligible for the position.
Karki was appointed CIAA chief in May 2013 despite facing charges by the Rayamajhi commission of having suppressed the people’s movement. The then Cabinet had also declared him ineligible to hold any public office in the future. As CIAA chief, Karki was accused of running a ‘parallel’ government and using his power and influence to fulfill his vested interests.
On January 8, a bench of justices Ishwar Prasad Khatiwada, Ananda Mohan Bhatarai, and Anil Kumar Sinha deemed Karki’s appointment to the post invalid, and said he was not qualified to hold the position.
The Supreme Court (SC) reopened Karki’s appointment case in September last year after a full bench of Chief Justice Sushila Karki and Justices Sapana Pradhan Malla and Bishwambhar Prasad Shrestha granted permission for reviewing the SC’s earlier verdict considering two major premises regarding Karki’s appointment: his tenure in government service and constitutional provision about his moral character to head the constitutional body.
