In the complaint filed at the anti-graft body, the Youth Association Nepal (YAN), a youth wing aligned with the CPN-UML, stated that the Maoist leadership had embezzled around Rs 40 million by producing fake combatants.
The complaint alleges that UCPN (Maoist) Chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal, PM Bhattarai and leader Krishna Bahadur Mahara were involved in misusing state funds. "These three leaders are involved in embezzling state funds and we demand that corruption controlling mechanisms like the CIAA take stern action against them," said YAN General Secretary, Niraj Acharya.
YAN members said that the step was taken after some Maoist youths themselves urged initiatives to expose corruption in the cantonments.
Receiving the complaints, CIAA Secretary and its acting chief Bhagwati Kumar Kafle, said the commission would seriously probe the matter. "We are serious about this matter and will look into it," said Kafle.
The United Nations Mission in Nepal in 2007 had verified 19,602 Maoist combatants. However, it later came to light that some 3,000 Maoist combatants were not available when the Special Committee verified the numbers before managing them. The Maoist party had been receiving monthly salaries and allowances for those missing combatants until their regrouping in December 2011.
The Maoist party had also formed an internal panel to investigate the matter after some combatants came down heavily on the party leadership at the party's seventh plenum in July. The former combatants have been claiming that their party leadership misused over Rs 10 billion. Despite pressure from opposition parties and members of the Special Committee to take up the issue, the CIAA has apparently not taken the issue seriously, except for committing to probe the matter.
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