The President's Office issued a press release on Monday and informed that the remaining punishment and fines awarded to 21 individuals, including Pandey, have been pardoned in line with the Article 151 of the Interim Constitution."Under the recommendation of the government, the president has pardoned individuals in very old cases, most of them from the Panchayat era," said Lalit Basnet, the legal advisor to the president.
Pandey was arrested from his residence in Baluwatar on March 17, 2015 on the charge of evading a 30-year-old jail sentence. However, Pandey has been staying in various hospitals citing health problems since his arrest.
The Supreme Court order on March 17 had paved the way for Pandey's arrest.
On June 30, 1982, the Kathmandu District Court had awarded Pandey, who was an employee at Nepal Water Supply Corporation, a jail term of three years and a fine of Rs 5,000 after finding him guilty of corruption. Pandey had immediately challenged the verdict and then court that heard appeals in corruption cases had upheld the verdict of Kathmandu District Court on June 20, 1984. Pandey was to serve around a year and nine months of the sentence, according to the court.
Pandey had been claiming that he received royal pardon in the case on November 20, 1985. Pandey says his wife had filed a petition at the then Special Complaints Division (Bishesh Jaheri Bibhag) and was exonerated.
As Pandey moved the Supreme Court on September 5, 2014, the single bench of Justice Cholendra SJB Rana had issued an interim order stating that sending Pandey to jail without first making sure whether the case was settled through royal pardon may cause him damage. Following the order, Kathmandu District Court had filed a petition on November 8, 2014 at the Supreme Court demanding to quash the interim order.
A division bench of current chief justice Kalyan Shrestha and Justice Om Prakash Mishra had quashed the previous order and directed Kathmandu District Court to act in line with the legal provisions.
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