BYD vehicles seized from the Korala border checkpoint in Mustang on the pretext of being imported into Nepal in the face of the budget have been released after 9 days. The Armed Police Force had seized 649 electric vehicles brought from the checkpoint at Kushma in Parbat and Hemja in Kaski, among other places. After the government instructed them to release them, saying they had entered the country after passing the inspection process, the businessmen have started taking them.

The release of all the seized vehicles has started from Saturday, said Bidur Chudal, head of the Mustang Customs Office, Korala. ‘The process of taking them is ongoing as the stopped vehicles have been released,’ he said, ‘649 vehicles had passed customs inspection, they were stopped at various places, now they are being released.’

He said that on the first day, Saturday, 108 vehicles were taken by businessmen. According to him, out of the 774 vehicles that came to the checkpoint, only 649 vehicles passed customs inspection and were released. The remaining 125 vehicles are in the process of customs clearance and all belong to BYD company, the customs office said. "After removing the vehicles stopped in Kushma and Hemja, the vehicles from Jomsom have started to be removed. Out of the 265 vehicles stopped in those places, 222 have been removed," said Chief Chudal. "Currently, there are 43 vehicles in Jomsom."

An investigation committee was formed under the coordination of Bhupal Raj Shakya, Director of the Customs Department under the Ministry of Finance, regarding the vehicles entering from Korala in Mustang and another director, Surendra Pandey, under the coordination of Rasuwa. However, the government has instructed to release the stopped vehicles without making the report public. So far, neither the Customs Department nor the Ministry of Finance have officially made the report public.

Before the budget statement for the fiscal year 2083/84 was made public, the Armed Police Force in Jomsom, Kushma and Hemja seized electric vehicles that had passed customs inspection at the Korala checkpoint on suspicion of leaking information related to tax rate manipulation. Similarly, vehicles imported from Rasuwagadhi have been stopped at Timure. While the investigation into the electric vehicles imported from Rasuwa and Mustang was ongoing, the Ministry of Finance had clarified that all the vehicles had been inspected in a proper manner. 

Navin Dhungana, Personal Undersecretary and Public Relations Advisor to Finance Minister Swarnim Wagle, had stated in a press release on 26 Jestha that all the electric vehicles had been inspected in a proper manner. The Finance Ministry had clarified that the import businessmen had received information from the budget-making body that customs duties would increase or decrease, saying that the vehicles had entered Nepal through the old and regular import process. 

The stopped vehicles were released after no faults were found, said Kishore Bartaula, Director and Information Officer of the Customs Department. ‘Can all the goods of the traders be stopped after no faults are found?,’ he said, ‘There is suspicion about the goods being imported during the budget period, at that time, the state got suspicious because the vehicles were imported all at once, but during the investigation, it was found that all the procedures were completed and it was released.’

Bartaula said that nothing was found in the investigation report. ‘The report has already come,’ he said, ‘Since the person who brought the vehicle did not appear to have done anything wrong in the report, did we stop his business?’ He said that all the vehicles stopped at the Korala checkpoint have been released. ‘Now, regular inspection work is done at the customs checkpoint,’ he said.