The Kaski Court has set a deadline of November 10 for parties who are required to appear for the case dates from Bhadra 23 to Kartik 10, and for parties whose case registration deadline expires during this period, they must take a date and register the case by November 10.
Since the arson attack on Bhadra 24, the Kaski District Court has been operating from tents, sheds, and damaged buildings. Sessions have been held wherever there is free space.
The room that was vacant after Shrestedar Rajan Khanal went on leave was converted into courtroom number two on Friday. The work of setting up tents in the court premises before Tihar has now been shifted to the Kaski District Bar Association building.
The work of the Kaski District Court, which was partially operational before Tihar, has been fully operational since Kartik 11. The courtroom has also been held in the judge's residence in the court premises, a building damaged by the arson. The main court building has not been used as it has been reduced to rubble due to the arson. A yellow sticker has also been pasted on another building nearby. Two courtrooms are held on the upper floor of this building.
There are 8 courtrooms in the Kaski District Court. Of these, 7 were held before the movement because one judge was transferred. After the Tihar vacation, one, two to five courtrooms have been held. On Friday, 16 cases were heard in 5 sessions. Ram Bahadur Kisan, Information Officer of the District Court, Kaski, said that all the work has started despite the lack of physical and equipment.
He said that work is being done using the structures that survived the fire as there has been no directive from the Supreme Court to move to a new location. He said that there is also a problem with essential resources including computers and printers. ‘The physical structure, missiles, equipment are destroyed by fire. There were 55-60 computers. All have burned down. We are in the process of replenishing them,’ he said.
From Bhadra 29, the Kaski Court had started the service of extension of time, permission for call details, approval of urgent arrest warrant, permission for arrest warrant, application for detention-examination, statement and detention of the defendants who were presented with the indictment, marriage registration, certification of official inheritance, applications as per Section 155 of the Criminal Procedure Code 2074, and amendment of the prisoner certificate. These works were done by putting up a tent in the court premises and cleaning the remaining rooms.
From Asoj 26, the court started taking registration of cases that would be settled on the same day or the next day. Since the files of the registered ongoing cases and cases for which a verdict is yet to be prepared were destroyed in the fire, the court has started working from Asoj 26 itself for the purpose of creating files. The court has issued a notice to the parties coming to appear in the case/file a case file along with the documents and evidence they or the legal practitioner have, including the complaint, reply, statement, date sheet, order, etc., and to appear at the relevant court.
The parties who have to appear on the case file from Bhadra 23 to Kartik 10 and the parties whose case registration deadline expires during this period have to take a date and register the case by Mangsir 10. The court notice states that if the work is not done within this period, the deadline will expire.
Information Officer Kisan said that 30 percent of the 70,000 cases and records in the Kaski Court have been damaged. The staff estimates that the cases and other records from after 2076 BS have been burned. The drawers in the front of the room where the records are kept were burned. On Bhadra 25, the court staff tried to enter the room while the fire was still burning and save the cases. As a result, 70 percent of the old files in the court are safe. ‘Initially, we were afraid to enter the archive room, wondering if everything had burned. The next day, we were able to extinguish the fire with our staff,’ he said. ‘Out of the 70,000, it is estimated that 70 percent of the files and records have been saved.’
According to him, the number of files that survived the fire has not been calculated. For this, the work of destroying old files (identifying and throwing away documents that will not be needed until later) is being done, he said. ‘We were not able to destroy old files because there is a lot of pressure on other work in Kaski. Since there is no place for employees to work, we have prioritized the work of destroying files by utilizing the staff there,’ he said.
The district court is not in a position to immediately build a new building due to the lack of budget resources. The idea that Pokhara's old airport can be used as a courthouse is being heard from legal practitioners who have been in court. The district court is awaiting instructions from the Supreme Court to operate from the damaged building.
