Kathmandu, January 10 (HS): Former Deputy Prime Minister Ravi Lamichhane, who was in the custody of Pokhara Police for the last 84 days in the case of fraud of crores from the cooperative bank, was released on bail on Thursday evening, but he will have to appear in the District Court of Kathmandu today itself.

Hearing the bail application after interrogation and statement in the fraud case in Pokhara's Suryadarshan Cooperative Bank, District Court Pokhara ordered the release of Ravi Lamichhane on January 9 on a personal bond of Rs 65 lakh. After this, he was released late at night. Since Ravi Lamichhane has been made the main accused in the cooperative bank scam of four other districts besides Pokhara, he will have to first appear in the Kathmandu District Court on Friday. National Independent Party spokesperson Manish Jha said that Ravi is reaching Kathmandu by plane today to appear in Kathmandu District Court.

Ravi Lamichhane has been made the main accused in Kathmandu's Swarnalakshmi Cooperative Bank scam, so he will have to take bail from here as well. Deepak Thapa, head of Central Investigation Bureau (CIB) which is investigating this entire case, said that an application was filed by him in Pokhara District Court to hand over Ravi to Kathmandu Police, but Ravi was not handed over to Kathmandu Police on the condition of Ravi's lawyer appearing in person.

Hindusthan Samachar / Indrani Sarkar