Supreme Court annuls decision to commute former APF DIG Ranjan Koirala’s life sentence

NL Today

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Kathmandu: The Supreme Court (SC) on Thursday invalided its earlier decision to reduce the life sentence of Ranjan Koirala, a former deputy inspector general of the Armed Police Force.

A bench of Acting Chief Justices Deepak Kumar Karki, Tank Moktan, and Kumar Chudal dismissed the earlier decision of the apex court to cut the 20-year sentence to eight and a half years.

In January 2012, the Kathmandu District Court slapped Koirala with a life term after he was convicted of murdering his wife Gita Dhakal. The decision was upheld by the then Patan Appellate Court. Koirala had murdered his wife and burned her dead body to destroy all evidence in 2012.

Koirala was released in July 2020 after a division bench of now suspended Chief Justice Cholendra Shumsher Rana and Justice Tej Bahadur KC said that he could be released after serving eight years and six months in jail. The bench had maintained that the life imprisonment was too high stating that the incident seemed accidental.