Family members accompanying a Nepal police team to the site identified the body.
Similarly, another dead body, suspected to be that of Shiva Sena Nepal activist Chandra Chudal, who was said to have accompanied Rathi to India, was also found at the site. [break]
However, Chudal´s family is yet to identify the body.
Police had called Chudal´s brother from Jhapa for the purpose.
According to a highly-placed police source, both the bodies were recovered from the Tista River in the Indian state of West Bengal
Suspecting Rathi´s abduction, Nepal police had intensified its search in coordination with the Indian side.
Indian police in Siliguri last week arrested two Indian nationals -- Surendra Kumar Mishra and Abhijeet Basu-- in connection with their involvement in Rathi´s abduction.
According to a police source, Indian police had found the dead bodies, working on the basis of the statement recorded by the two arrested men. According to the Indian police, the other person thought to be Chudal was first to die at the hands of the kidnappers.
Rathi, who had gone to Siliguri via Kakadbhitta in Jhapa district in the second week of January, had been missing since January 11.
It was learnt from a family source that the kidnappers had made a ransom call from Rathi´s cell phone on the second day of his disappearance. The family informed police about the abduction only on January 18, when Rathi´s son registered a complaint with police in Morang.
The Indians, who were arrested along with a Rs 5 million ransom amount, had also indicated Chudal´s involvement in the abduction.
With Chudal apparently found dead, police suspect some other hand in Rathi´s abduction.
Chudal had registered a new faction of Siva Sena Nepal after splitting from the Siva Sena led by Arun Subedi.
According to sources, Bashu and Mishra, after taking the ransom amount, instructed the Rathi family to make contact with him, but they could not do so.
Rathi had reached the Indian border at Kakarbhitta in his private car. He turned the car back before entering India.
Rathi had been in the paddy, rice and oil products business for a long time. The owner of Biratnagar-based Chandra Shiva Rice and Oil Mill, he was chairman of the Morang district chapter of the Nepal Business Union from 1985 to 1988.
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