SC moved against CoAS, senior army officers

Wife of a former detainee at the Maharajgunj-based Bhairav Nath barracks, who was allegedly killed at the barracks by army officials, on thrusday filed a writ petition at the Supreme Court, seeking its order to the government authorities to prosecute senior army officials, including Chief of Army Staff Gen Rookmangud Katawal, for the murder.

Ram Maya, wife of late Padam Narayan Nakarmi, filed the petition, demanding that the Office of the Prime Minister and the Cabinet, Ministries of Home and Defence, and Inspector General of Police and his office prosecute Gen Katawal, retired Army Chief Pyar Jung Thapa, officials at the Bhairav Nath barracks, Raju Basnet, Bibek Bista, Indibur Rana and Dilip Rayamajhi, for the murder of her husband.

In the petition, Ram Maya said she moved the apex court after Nepali Police Headquarters and the Kathmandu District Police Office Kathmandu refused to accept the First Information Report on the murder case. She accused army officials Basnet, Bista, Rana and Rayamajhi of killing her husband two years ago under the order of the then Chief of Army Staff Pyar Jung Thapa.

She claimed in the petition that former detainees at the Bhairavnath barracks, Krishna KC and Himal Sharma, had informed her about the murder of her husband in the barracks. She claimed that the refusal to accept the FIR was in violation of Articles 11, 12 and 14 of the 1990 Constitution and International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights 1966 and Human Rights Declaration of 1948. The petitioner claimed that the apex court should intervene in the case, as she could not get justice from other authorities.