A day earlier, Bara District Court sentenced two accused in the murder of journalist Birendra Sah to life imprisonment with attachment of their property. Two of the five accused in Sah’s murder— Manager Giri and Ram Ekbal Sahani— now face life behind bars. Sah was abducted from Bara and later found dead.
With these two verdicts from the district courts, a pertinent question is, has justice been done? The families of the victims don’t think so. Neither do we. Ram Hari Shrestha’s widow Ramila told this newspaper after the Chitwan court verdict that she doesn’t feel the punishment is commensurate with the crime committed. Batala is accused of abducting Shrestha and being an accomplice in his murder.
He is also accused of dumping Shrestha’s body in the Narayani River to hide the crime. How come he got just a three-year jail sentence, which he has already served, and will walk away free if he is not detained on other pending charges.
The main issue here, however, is not just whether the accused and arrested have been adequately punished. The main accused in both the cases are still absconding. Four other accused in Shrestha’s murder --Kali Bahadur Kham, Keshav Adhikari, Ganga Ram Thapa and driver Arjun (first name only)-- have so far avoided arrest. Shrestha was murdered allegedly under the direction and oversight of former Maoist commander Kham, who was subsequently promoted by the Maoist party to its central committee but eventually dismissed for “gross misconduct”.
Likewise, chief accused in the Sah murder case Lal Bahadur Chaudhary and two co-accused Kundan Faujdar and Hare Ram Patel still move about freely. Following the verdict, Sah’s widow Umarawati said she will not feel that justice has been done so long as the main accused is still at large. That the main accused in both cases remained under the protection of the Maoists for so long and avoided arrest only because of that party’s influence is nothing but a travesty of justice. The two widows, who were victimized for no fault of their own or that of their husbands, deserve full justice.
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