Balkrishna Dhungel, an aspiring politico of Okhaldhunga, was angry about an inter-ethnic marriage in the family which involved Ujjan Kumar Shrestha. On 24 June 1998, he led a cohort that waylaid Ujjan on the trail to Ramechhap.
Dhungel shot Ujjan Kumar dead, and the body was dumped into the Likhu River, never to be found. Later, Ujjan’s brother Ganesh Kumar Shrestha was murdered by a Maoist group for daring to approach the court on the murder. Ganesh’s daughter, Rachana, who had innocently pointed out her father working on the family terrace, committed suicide out of guilt.
Dhungel went on to fight the CA elections in April 2006 and terrorised the voters to get elected. Convicted of murder by the district court and reconfirmed on appeal by the Supreme Court in January 2010, Dhungel moved about freely as member of the CA, mocking the justice system. Today, Jagat Das and Ram Kumari, the elderly parents of the two dead brothers, and their dauntless sister Sabitri, are fighting Prime Minister Baburam Bhattarai for having recommended a presidential pardon for Dhungel.
It is a brutal irony that the allegedly upright prime minister of Nepal has surrounded himself with unreformed bandits and murderers. Balkrishna Dhungel is on the top of that list, enjoying the cover of impunity provided by the Maoist top brass. Bhattarai is also close to the murder- accused Prabhu Sah of Birgunj, recently forced out of the cabinet.
Bhattarai also enjoys the support of many other human rights violators of the conflict era, including, it is said, the un-apprehended killers of teacher Muktinath Adhikari of Lamjung. With his weak support within the party, Bhattarai obviously has had to scrape the bottom of the barrel to build his own support base.
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