It has already been three years since the death of 13-year-old Nirmala Panta of Ultakham in Bhimdatta Municipality-2. She hasn’t received justice till date. The convicts of the incident have not been arrested yet.
On July 26, 2018, Nirmala had left her house to meet a friend and on July 27, her dead body was found near a pond in the sugarcane field of Nimbukheda of Bhimdatta Municipality.
In a conversation with INSEC, SP Umaprasad Chaturvedi of the District Police Office, Kanchanpur said that the incident is highly prioritized and is being minutely investigated by a joint team of Police Headquarters, Provincial Police Office, and District Police Office. He further added that at present they cannot publicize the facts detected during the investigation.
He said, “Just a week ago we had met the family of the victim and shared the facts with them. We hope that the perpetrator will soon be brought to book.”
The family and locals had protested against the incident and asked for justice for Nirmala. Many protestors were injured after the police had used force to control the crowd. Sunny Khuna, 17, of Bhimdatta Municipality-18 was shot dead by the bullet fired by the police.
The locals had accused the police of being careless in the investigation after which a team was formed under the leadership of Hari Prasad Mainali, Joint-Secretary of the Government of Nepal. Similarly, Internal Investigation Committee was formed under the leadership of DIG Dhiru Basnet.
The Internal Investigation Committee had suspended the then SP Dilliraj Bista of the District Police Office, Kanchanpur, DSPs Angoor GC and Gyanbahadur Sethi, Inspectors Jagdish Bhatta, and Ekendra Khadka and ASI Ram Singh Dhami but now all of them have received clearance.
Later, the Police Headquarters had formed a team of SSP Thakur Gyawali of Central Investigation Bureau (CIB) and SP Durga Singh of Police Headquarters for further investigation but even after three years of the incident, the culprits have not been found.
The clothes worn by Nirmala were cleaned by the police, her clothes were burnt during her final rituals and the books and copies found near the incident spot were not kept safely. Due to all these steps taken by the police, the family of the victim has questioned the accountability of the police administration.
INSEC and other organizations working in the field of human rights had conducted a fact-finding mission regarding the death of Nirmala Panta on July 28, 2018, and during this mission, the fact-finding team had met and gathered information from the then SP Dilli Raj Bista of District Police Office and Kumar Khadka, Chief District Officer of Kanchanpur.
A report was prepared after a meeting with the newly appointed Chief District Officer Taranath Adhikari and SP Kuber Kadayat of the District Police Office, Kanchanpur.
Click here to read the fact-finding report prepared by INSEC after the monitoring of the incident.
After the District Administration Office and District Police Office, Kanchanpur said that investigation is underway, the culprits will be made public soon and initiation will be taken to provide relief to the family of the victim, the victim’s family had conducted the final rites of the body on July 30, 2018.