Nepal's highest court on Tuesday jailed a former home minister for corruption in the latest in a series of high profile graft convictions of prominent public figures. The Supreme Court handed Khum Bahadur Khadka an 18-month sentence and 9.5-million-rupee ($110,000) fine after he failed to account for a vast portfolio of property accrued while in office.
"We have reached the conclusion that the defendant's source of income and the property he earned during the given period doesn't match," Kalyan Kumar Shrestha, one of two presiding judges, told reporters. "He failed to verify the source of income for 9.47 million rupees. This shows if one commits crime, no matter how powerful, he (or) she will be convicted," Shrestha said, adding that the authorities would confiscate property equivalent in value to the fine. Khadka, 61, held a number of high-ranking posts, including home minister and local development minister, in the 1990s when the Nepali Congress, now in opposition, was in power.