The Chief Judge of the Kathmandu District Court, Chudamani Khadka, stated that by the end of the fiscal year 2025/26, 26,445 cases remained pending before the court. According to him, a total of 46,277 cases were registered with the Kathmandu District Court during the fiscal year. Of these, only 19,832 cases were resolved through final judgements, while the remaining 26,445 cases are still pending.
The District Court stated that the number of registered cases remains high, the damage caused to important case files during last year’s Gen Z movement, has further impacted the process of administration of justice.
According to the Kathmandu District Court, during the Gen Z protest on September 9 2025 arson and other incidents destroyed the files of 2,230 cases. Although the process of recovering and reworking on most of these files has progressed, Chief Judge Khadka said that the files for 190 cases still cannot be traced.
The destruction of case files requires the court to recollect evidence, relevant documents, and procedural records related to the case. This situation has resulted in significant delays in regular hearings and delivery of judgements. The court said it is closely working with the concerned stakeholders, government agencies, and legal professionals to recreate the missing records.
Following the Gen Z protest, the court’s regular services were also impacted for some time. Regular hearings resumed only from November 30 2025. Since then, the court has been making efforts to reduce the backlog of pending cases. However, the destruction of case files, the increasing number of new cases, and limited resources the number of unresolved cases still remains high. The Kathmandu District Court is one of the courts with the large volume of cases. With thousands of new cases being registered each year, resolving older cases while managing new cases has become challenging.
The Kathmandu District Court has said to reduce the number of pending cases in the upcoming fiscal year, it plans to schedule hearings on prioritization basis, to accelerate the process of restoration of damaged case files and to make the process of administration of justice more efficient.