April 5: An appeal has been filed at the Supreme Court against the decision of the Special Court to acquit 21 people, including the head of Kalika Construction, Bikram Pandey, who were accused of corruption in the Sikta Irrigation Project, one of the national pride projects under construction in Banke.

The Commission for the Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA) on Tuesday appealed to the Supreme Court against the decision of the Special Court. After spending almost Rs 15.5 billion the  in the project, the main canal of Sikta collapsed during the testing phase prompting the authority to file a case against Pandey and 20 others who were assigned various responsibilities. However, the special court acquitted the accused on the ground that the original canal had collapsed due to poor structure of the soil.

There is a legal provision that the contractor company has to bear the responsiblity for all the repairs and maintenance if there is damage to any project within one year of the completion of the construction work. However, the project leaders at that time did not repair the original canal.

Shortly before the federal election, Pandey was allowed to become a candidate after being acquitted by the Special Court. He also became a minister in the government that was formed immediately after winning the election. The authority has claimed Rs 8.59 billion from all the accused including Rs 2.13 billion from Pandey.

CIAA has filed cases against Saroj Chandra Pandit, director general of the Irrigation Department, project managers Sarvadev Prasad and Ramesh Basnet, senior divisional engineer of the project, managing director of Kalika Construction among others.