The incident of indecent behavior and beating of two employees of Jyoti Bikas Bank who had reached Saptakoshi Integrated Agro Farm Pvt. Ltd., Odraha, Saptakoshi Municipality-7, Saptari, to communicate with the debtor has gone viral on social media. What is the background of this incident? How did this incident come to light? We have tried to explain it in five questions and answers.

What is the background to this incident?
Saptakoshi Integrated Agro Farm Pvt. Ltd., located in Odraha, Saptakoshi Municipality-7, had taken a loan of Rs. 45 million from Jyoti Bikas Bank on April 23, 2078. When the loan was taken, 3 bighas and 14 katthas of land in the same place and 16 katthas and 8 dhurs of land in Kanchanrup Municipality-12 in the name of the Pvt. Ltd. were pledged as collateral. However, when the Pvt. Ltd. did not pay the installment after April 28, 2081, the bank issued a second notice, and shareholder Prabhunarayan Chaudhary reached the central office and requested not to auction the land immediately.

According to Chaudhary, after the request, on November 24, the debt recovery department of the central office sent a letter citing invoice number 393843 and suspending the auction process. A written agreement was also reached on the same day with the bank's provincial office deputy manager (debt recovery chief) Sumit Shrestha and Rupani branch's debt recovery officer Sabin Shrestha. Chaudhary has been claiming that the dispute escalated after the Shrestha duo threatened to auction the land despite the agreement to pay the installments regularly.

The bank had issued a 7-day notice for the last time on November 19 to auction the mortgaged land. The shareholders were angry that the institution and the shareholders were defamed when the bank advertised that 3 bighas and 14 kathas of land were for sale before the notice expired. In this context, last Wednesday, the provincial office deputy manager (debt recovery chief) Sumit and Rupani branch's debt recovery officer Sabin had gone there to talk to the company's owner about how to 'settlement' the installment. At that time, they were subjected to indecent behavior and beatings. The video of this incident was captured by the locals. However, it seems that it was only made public on social media last Sunday. In which the employee is seen being beaten with a stick while wearing a garland of shoes.

Who is involved in this incident?

The incident of indecent behavior and beating of the deputy manager (debt recovery chief) of the bank's provincial office Sumit Shrestha and the debt recovery officer of the Rupani branch, Sabin Shrestha, has been confirmed to have been directly involved in the incident of indecent behavior and beating of Deputy Mayor Rita Kumari Chaudhary, who is also the coordinator of the judicial committee of Saptakoshi Municipality. She is the wife of Sanjeev Kumar Chaudhary, a shareholder of the company. When the bank employee Shrestha arrived that day, she is seen in the video abusing and beating him with a stick.

Initially, Deputy Mayor Chaudhary was also inciting other shareholders to wear a garland of shoes and rub moss on the bank employee. When I tried to understand about it, her phone did not pick up. Mayor Krishna Prasad Dhakal, who later reached there, hushed up the incident. He also did not want to talk about it. When asked what the incident was about Deputy Mayor Chaudhary beating up a bank employee, Mayor Dhakal hung up the phone saying, "I am in a meeting right now, I will talk to you later." DSP Madhav Prasad Kafle, Chief of the Area Police Office, Kanchanpur, confirmed that Deputy Mayor Chaudhary was seen beating up a bank employee in the video.

The bank has filed a complaint alleging that the deputy mayor's husband Sanjeev and son Siraj, shareholders Prabhunarayan Chaudhary and Panchadev, debtor and shareholder Umakanta Chaudhary and Rabindra Swarnakar were involved in the beating incident.

What happened after this incident became public?
After the incident, the bank has filed a complaint against 7 people at the Area Police Office, Kanchanpur for kidnapping, hostage-taking, beating and robbery. The complaint against Deputy Mayor Chaudhary and others has not yet been registered. DSP Kafle says that coordination is being done with the victim. District Police Spokesperson DSP Dambar Bahadur Puri said that action will be taken against anyone involved in the incident as per the law. He said that further investigation into the incident is underway.

What does Saptakoshi Integrated Agro Farm Pvt. Ltd. say about the incident?
Chaudhary, a shareholder of the company, said that the dispute arose because the employees were threatening to auction the land even though the notice of the auction had been postponed as per the written agreement. He said that the shareholders were angry when the bank continued to threaten to auction the land even though the video advertisement for the sale of the land was removed from TikTok as per the agreement. However, he did not want to talk about where and when the agreement was made. According to him, he was in Rajbiraj at the time of the incident.

What is the bank's statement on this incident?
Bank Information Officer Prakash Baral said that after the employee was held hostage after being mistreated and beaten, he was forced to send a letter suspending the auction. He said, ‘The employee was being threatened to leave only after sending the letter. And we sent a letter suspending the auction from here for the safety of the employee.’ He said that the employee who had gone to talk about how to regularize the installment was beaten in a planned manner. He demanded that legal action be taken against those involved as this incident has weakened the morale of the employee.

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