Lumbini assembly member files forgery case against Speaker Gharti and four others

Ambika Kafle, a member of the Lumbini Provincial Assembly from the Janata Samajbadi Party Nepal (JSP Nepal), filed a forgery case at the Dang District Court on Tuesday, October 27, against five people, including Speaker Tularam Gharti Magar, according to Onlinekhabar, Nagarik, Ratopati and Gorkhapatra.

The defendants named in her plaint are the Speaker; the Assembly's secretary, Durlabh Kumar Pun Magar; Lokmani Pandey, spokesperson of the Assembly secretariat; Assembly member Santosh Pandey; and Ajay Kumar Jha, who, Nagarik reported, is accused in the plaint of sending the disputed letter on the party's letterhead.

Kafle claims that the letter used to remove her from her seat was prepared with the party's name, letterhead, seal and office-bearers' names but without any decision or authorisation from the party. She says she has not resigned, left the party or joined another one.

Proceedings against Kafle began on the charge that she had broken the parliamentary party's directive on the confidence vote for Chief Minister Chet Narayan Acharya. According to Nagarik, the disputed letter was registered with the Assembly secretariat on Monday, September 7 (Bhadra 22), and on Wednesday, September 9 (Bhadra 24), on the recommendation of JSP Nepal parliamentary party leader Santosh Kumar Pandey, the secretariat issued a notice declaring her seat vacant.

Kafle challenged that decision at the Supreme Court, which on Tuesday, September 22 (Asoj 6), issued an interim order in her favour not to implement it. Her new case in the district court is a separate criminal complaint: she wants action under sections 276 and 277 of the Muluki Criminal Code, 2074.

The plaint asks the court to examine the original letter, the secretariat's registration and dispatch records, its office decision, the party's official correspondence and samples of the letterhead, seal and signatures, and to establish the role of each person involved. It also asks the court to declare the letter forged and invalid and to award her a legal remedy for the harm she has suffered.

According to Onlinekhabar, JSP Nepal general secretary Dr Surendra Kumar Jha told the party's Lumbini Assembly members on August 17 to follow the party's directive in the confidence vote. The party later expelled Santosh Pandey, Bhandari Lal Ahir, Adesh Agrawal and Hema Belwase KC, who had voted confidence in Acharya against that directive, and informed the Assembly secretariat. Kafle alleges that the Speaker and the secretariat took no action against those four while acting against her without consulting the party leadership, to keep the government in power.