SC panel grills security officials on disappearances

A probe panel headed by appellate court judge Lokendra Mallik today interrogated Colonel of the Nepali Army Pawan Pandey and AIGP Amar Singh Shah in connection with the disappearance of two detainees from the no. 1 Bahani of the army barracks in Balaju. The SC had constituted the panel.“We questioned them about the disappearance of detainees Bipin Bhandari and Dil Bahadur Rai from the Bahini. The two were taken into custody in the Bahini and disappeared from there,” said an official of the panel. Government Joint Attorney Saroj Gautam and advocate Govinda Bandi are the other members of the probe panel.According to the official, chairman and members of the panel inspected the Bahani after the interrogation and collected documents related to detention of a number of people in the past. “We found clues about illegal detention of several persons in the past,” he added.“During the interrogation, they (Pandey and Shah) claimed that security agencies had no policy to make people disappear,” the official said.They told the panel that all the security agencies had worked together under the command of the then Royal Nepalese Army in the past. “There is no question of disappearing anyone to fulfil the interest of any particular security agency,” they said.