Kathmandu, July 26
A team of Nepal Police investigators has recovered the CCTV footage of the Ministry of Finance which the ministry had claimed automatically deleted. The team has submitted the footage to a parliamentary committee investigating charges labelled against then Finance Minister Janardan Sharma.
A source at the Parliament Secretariat says police have submitted 51 clips of May 28, when some unauthorised people allegedly entered the ministry to tamper with the tax rates in the annual budget plan to be announced the next day.
Since the clips are not clear enough to recognise the people seen in them, lawmakers are consulting experts again.
Janardan Sharma was under fire after Annapurna Post reported that he changed tax rates in the budget plan for the next fiscal year under some industrialists’ pressure.
As the news reported that the industrialists’ representatives entered the ministry office on the eve of the budget announcement to tamper with the document, there was a call to investigate the CCTV footage. But, the ministry had said the footage was automatically deleted.
Upon the protests, the House of Representatives formed the committee to look into the charges against Minister Sharma on July 6 which began working on July 12. Sharma had resigned minutes after the probe team was formed.
The committee had quizzed Janardan Sharma over the charges, but he pleaded innocent.
