Argument on behalf of the defendant Lamichhane will be held on Friday, in Thursday's argument, the high government prosecutor insists that Ravi should be kept in custody, the order may come on Friday itself.
The Supreme Court of Butwal in the case of Ravi Lamichhane and Chabilal Joshi in the case of Butwal Supreme Cooperative Fraud and Organized Crime has been kept under review at the Butwal Bench of Tulsipur. After the arguments of Ravi Lamichhane's lawyer on behalf of the defendant failed, the case was adjourned for Friday.
The Ruppandehi District Court released Ravi on a bond of Rs 1 crore in the case of embezzlement of more than 550 million rupees of the cooperative with the involvement of 42 people including Ravi, Image and Gitendrababu (GB) Rai in Supreme Cooperative and additional charges of embezzlement of 100 million 99936 thousand by Ravi, Image and GB separately. In the same case, Chabilal Joshi has been sent to prison for preliminary investigation.
After Ravi was granted bail and Chibi was imprisoned in a case of a similar nature, the public prosecutor's office appealed to the High Court that Ravi should also be kept in prison. Similarly, the image has also filed a petition in the higher court saying that it should be released on bail. In the same case, Ravi also registered number 73 saying that he should be able to fight the case on the same date for taking bail. After 73 cases of the same nature were registered separately, the High Court of Butwa ordered them to be considered together.
According to the order of the High Court, the demand of the image to fight the case without being detained, the demand of the government lawyer to keep Ravi in detention without bail and the request that Ravi be kept in ordinary custody without bail, all the three cases were put together in one hearing on Thursday. After the debate in the same hearing was over, the case was kept under consideration. Thursday's hearing was held in the bench of High Court Judge Ramesh Dhakal and Sankawa Parajuli. Associate Advocate Somkant Bhandari, Deputy Advocate Prakash Marasini and Assistant Advocate Vasantraj Pokharel argued on behalf of the High Public Prosecutor's Office.
Co-attorney Bhandari insisted that there should be no confusion about the fact that he should be kept in prison because he is absconding through Gharbari, Cooperative, and Beggar with the intention of defrauding the Supreme Cooperative's funds. He insisted that the defendant Ravi Lamichhane should be kept in prison as the facts and evidence clearly show that he saved the daily expenses from Sarvadharan and sent it to the cooperative through Gharbari.
Deputy Attorney General Prakash Marasini said that although the burden of Aadhaar was high, Lamichhane's Aadhaar was heavy, but the order to release him on bail was different. Marasini demanded that the source of Ravi's 1 crore deposit should also be found. He argued that Ravi should also be kept in custody as the defendant can influence both the case and the evidence.
Similarly, senior advocates Shambhu Thapa and Apoorva Khatiwada argued on behalf of the defendant Chabilal Joshi. In the debate, both of them insisted that although Joshi was the vice president of Gorkha Media Network, he did not embezzle the money by signing any check and should be left as a simple date as he was not directly connected. Harigopal Gyawali, Sub-Registrar of the High Court Tulsipur Butwal Bench said that after the arguments of the lawyers on behalf of the defendant Ravilal Lamichhane, the case was kept under observation and the arguments will start on Friday.
Earlier, after the public prosecutor demanded to hear Lamichhane's case together with Joshi, the bench demanded Lamichhane's condition report. In the Supreme Cooperative fraud case, on January 13th, the bench of Rupandehi District Court Judge Prahrilad Kumar Yogi ordered the then managing director Lamichhane to be released on a bond of 1 crore.
In the same case, the bench of Judge Vashishth Kumar Ghimire of District Court Rupandehi ordered that former DIG Joshi, who is also the owner of Gorkha Media, should be sent to prison pending trial. Joshi's son Rochak Joshi filed a petition in the High Court against the detention order. On January 30, the High Court ordered the submission of the Qaifiat report while conducting a preliminary hearing on the petition.
