Police declared him as the kingpin of a poaching racket a few hours after five members including a Maoist commander were arrested from a lodge at Macchapokhari in possession of a rhino-horn. [break]
Chari has been associated with the CPN-UML for the last five years. He was elected the party´s Dhading District Constituency-2 vice-chairman early this year. He is the one who became the matter of a serious debate between senior leader KP Sharma Oli and his critics during the party central committee meeting last month.
Sharma was accused of favoring Chari and putting pressure on police to release the notorious gangster as Chari was detained on the charges of illegal possession of firearm and extortion. Sharma later said at a public function that the police were conspiring against the Youth Force stalwart by fabricating criminal charges.
Chari is considered as a close associate of Youth Force Chairman Mahesh Basnet like Parashuram Basnet of Biratnagar who has been absconding for over a month after masterminding two criminal attacks including the one on Republic correspondent Khilanath Dhakal. Parashuram´s case is still an embarrassment for the government for its s failure to nab and prosecute him. He has been linked to a number of crimes committed under the cover of a Youth Force commander.
Chari is one of the capital-based major gangsters who rose from rags to riches in a few years. He has been arrested by the Central Investigation Bureau (CIB) at a time when the Nepal Police was also on a lookout to nail him for his involvement in extortion racket.
A CIB team, conducting its special operation against wildlife-criminals, arrested Chari following a tip-off. They had arrested on Thursday night five poachers including Dipak Bahadur Hamal, an assistant section commander of PLA´ Third Division of the UCPN (Maoist), from one Dhading-Gorkha Lodge at Machhapokhari. Based on his statement, CIB sleuths nabbed three others including Chari and one Pancha Kumar Lama, another gangster.
All eight arrested were sent on Friday evening to Chitwan National Park Office for prosecution as per the wildlife conservation laws.
A terrible crime record
It´s the fifth consecutive time that Chari has been arrested on a criminal charge. In his eight years stint in the capital as a gangster, he has been linked to three murder-attempt cases since 2006 and jailed thrice. He even surrendered to the Kathmandu Police two years ago while he was being hunted down in connection with a murder-attempt on a trader. He had even fled from the police detention in 2006.
So far, Chari has been given a clean chit by the court in two murder-attempt cases. As lately as a couple of months ago, the government only prosecuted Chari on a public offence charge and made possible his release on a bail despite combined dual charges of illegal arm possession and extortion.
Chari was even said to have freed himself from the police custody in 2009 bribing a police inspector following his arrest at Thamel immediately after shooting at a trader.
Related story
Sushant Ghimire’s ‘Mann Chari’ hits success with over 710k YouT...
