In an unprecedented move, the newly formed Balendra Shah government in Nepal has constituted a five-member judicial panel to probe the assets of people holding public office from 2006 to the current financial year 2025-26, launching the most comprehensive probe yet into the country’s post-monarchy political and bureaucratic elite.The move will bring under its ambit former King Gyanendra Shah, three presidents, all heads of government since 2005-06, including two interim arrangements, and a wide group of ministers, constitutional functionaries and senior bureaucrats.Those expected to come under its ambit include former Presidents Ram Baran Yadav and Bidya Devi Bhandari and current President Ram Chandra Paudel; Former Prime Ministers Girija Prasad Koirala, Pushpa Kamal Dahal, Madhav Kumar Nepal, Jhala Nath Khanal, Baburam Bhattarai, KP Sharma Oli and Sher Bahadur Deuba; and two interim heads of government – Khilraj Regmi and Sushila Karki.
There has also been a broader focus on figures from Shah’s own political ecosystem, which expectedly includes current president Dol Prasad Aryal, ministers Birajbhakt Shrestha and Shishir Khanal and Rashtriya Swatantra Party chief Rabi Lamichhane, who held public office in earlier governments. The investigation is also expected to extend to the properties of deceased leaders, bringing the families and political heirs of personalities like Girija Prasad Koirala and Sushil Koirala under the scanner.The five-member commission, headed by retired Supreme Court judge Rajendra Kumar Bhandari, was formed weeks after Shah’s Rashtriya Swatantra Party won the March 5 election in the wake of last year’s youth-led anti-corruption protests.Cabinet spokesperson Sasmit Pokharel said the panel will investigate the assets of political functionaries and senior officials on the basis of law and evidence. “An impartial investigation will be conducted based on evidence as per legal standards… Its report and recommendations will be implemented by concerned agencies of the government,” he said.Under Shah’s 100-point governance reform plan, the first phase will examine those who served from 2006 to the current financial year, while the second phase will look at the period from 1991 to 2005.The Nepali Congress, the main opposition party in parliament, said such a commission was appropriate, but argued that the mechanism should be enshrined in permanent law and should not be politicized. Spokesman Devraj Chalisa said, “We are clear that the assets of those holding executive positions since 1990 should be investigated. Instead of constituting such a commission, legal provisions should be established. The investigation should be impartial and evidence-based.” Oli’s CPN-UML also supported the investigation in principle, while stressing that the commission should work on facts and truth. Rakshya Bam, a 26-year-old Gen Z activist who was at the forefront of the September 2025 revolt that toppled the Oli government, told TOI, “We welcome the verdict – our protest, among other issues, was against corruption in the upper echelons of the political system. However, the real test is political will. It is well known that an asset investigation panel was constituted by the Deuba government in 2002, and submitted a report in 2003 Had gone. However, its findings were never made public.
