Janakpur High Court has decided to dismiss the charges against Ramlal Bamjan, also known as 'Tapaswi' Ram Bahadur Bamjan, who was found guilty by the district court in the rape of a girl child because of the statute of limitations. The full text of the verdict passed by the bench of Justices Khemraj Bhatt and Narishwar Bhandari on March 6 has been released on Thursday.

District Court Sarlahi had decided to sentence Bamjan to 10 years in prison and a fine of 500,000 for sexually abusing children on June 17 last year. In the appeal, the High Court ruled that the case should be dismissed as there was no need to consider the justification of the district court's sentence as the case would not be tried due to the limitation period. The High Court is of the opinion that the Sarlahi District Court has imposed a limit on the Children's Act 2075, which cannot be enforced.

A girl living in an ashram at Sarlahi in Bamjan filed a complaint at the district police office on 23 Jan 2076 saying that she was raped at 9:10 pm on 20 July 2073. The girl had been living in Bamjan's ashram since 2071. It was the girl's statement that Bamjan called Lalife in her room and forced her to lock her up. Even after that, the girl alleged that Bamjan repeatedly molested her and threatened to kill someone. The victim was 14 years old when she was first raped.

According to the police investigation report, the public prosecutor's office, Sarlahi, filed a case in the district court with the demand that Bamjan should be punished according to Section 74 of the Children Act 2075. It is mentioned in the police investigation report that the other teenage girl who came to Bamjan's ashram to become an aunt also ran away after learning about the incident and the victim also ran away and stayed in Kathmandu. In the report, it is said that Bamjan and Kumar Bamjan and Jit Bahadur Tamang involved in driving away, hiding and protecting him from arrest should be punished according to Section 36(2) of the National Criminal Code 2074.

In the indictment filed by the district public prosecutor's office in the district court, punishment was demanded against Bamjan, who identified himself as Topcheng Mahatma Guru, and Jit Bahadur Tamang, known as JB Guru, with the argument that Bamjan had committed an offense under Section 66(3)(g) and (h) of the Children Act, 2075. Judge Jeevan Kumar Bhandari of Sarlahi District Court, hearing about it, on 17 June 2081, found Bamjan guilty of extortion and sentenced him to 10 years imprisonment. He made a decision based on the civil law prevailing at the time of the crime. He said in the verdict, "Since it is seen that he has committed the crime of child sexual abuse, which is prohibited by prevailing law and is considered a heinous crime, the prevailing law at the time of the incident, the prevailing law at the time of the incident, the following (3) of Section 3 of the Extortion Act, the defendant Ram Bahadur Bamjan, Ramlal Bamjan, is sentenced to 10 years in prison and the victim Namthar (A) to pay compensation of five lakh rupees."

Other defendants Gyan Kumar Bamjan and Jit Bahadur Tamang were acquitted. Against that, both the plaintiff and the defendant appealed to the Janakpur High Court. Bamjan's demand was that he should be acquitted as he was not guilty of the incident, while the public prosecutor's office insisted that Bamjan himself along with the other two who were acquitted should be prosecuted according to the Children Act 2075. In the Children's Act 2048, which was in force at the time of the

incident, it is mentioned that children should file a complaint against the crime committed against them within two years. According to that, the High Court dismissed the case against Bamjan saying that the complaint should have been filed within 20 July 2075, the date of the incident.

According to the general legal principle, a crime committed earlier cannot be prosecuted and punished according to the legal provisions made later. It is also called the retrospective principle of law. Based on this principle, the court decided that the punishment cannot be awarded because the process of prosecuting him was wrong.