Kathmandu, September 28
Questions have been raised in Parliament over the taking into custody and subsequent release of former Chief Justice Cholendra Shumsher Rana.
Nepali Communist Party chief whip Yubaraj Dulal, UML chief whip Ain Bahadur Mahar and Shram Sanskriti Party lawmaker Dhrubaraj Rai, among others, raised the issue.
“Without an arrest warrant, without any reason, the government has once again shown an example of a lawless state, and in the middle of the night it has shown a new stunt,” Chief Whip Dulal said.
He asked whether the country is moving ahead as a state of law or is in a lawless state. If there is a security threat, he asked, should the person making the threat be arrested, or someone else?
UML chief whip Mahar said, “It was arrested in the style of thuggery, in the style of abduction. It presented a blatant specimen of state terror.”
They protested that he was taken into custody and released as if “I am the state.”
Shram Sanskriti Party’s Dhrubaraj Rai sought answers from the government on the arrests of Bharat Dahal and Cholendra Shumsher Rana.
The government had arrested political analyst and writer Bharat Dahal a few days earlier. A Supreme Court bench of Justice Kumar Regmi later ordered that the written reasons for Dahal’s arrest be submitted.
Lawmaker Rai linked this to the police taking former Chief Justice Rana into custody and releasing him.
Police took Rana into custody from his home on Saturday night. However, police have not clearly stated which offence or on what grounds he was held. Government bodies have also said nothing officially about it.
In the meantime, Rana, taken into custody at night, was released during the day.
The Shram Sanskriti Party has demanded that Prime Minister Shah himself answer on these matters.
“One moment Bharat Dahal is arrested, they do it, and release him. Then Cholendra Shumsher is picked up and released,” Rai asked. “At least if the matter is serious, treat it seriously. If not, how exactly is this government working?”
