Nepal’s anti-corruption agency is moving forward with one of the biggest corruption cases in the country’s aviation history, targeting 55 people and a Chinese construction company for alleged misuse of money during the building of the Pokhara International Airport. The Commission for the Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA) is asking the court to recover USD 62.8 million (NPR 8.36 billion) from each accused person.
The case names five former ministers, 10 former secretaries, senior officials of the Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal (CAAN), and China CAMC Engineering, the company that built the airport with a loan from China Exim Bank. Those accused include former finance minister Ram Sharan Mahat, former tourism ministers Bhim Acharya, Ram Kumar Shrestha, Deepak Amatya, and the late Post Bahadur Bogati, whose wife has been listed for compensation. CAAN’s current director general Pradeep Adhikari and former director Murari Bhandari, who are already facing charges in another corruption case, are also included.
According to the CIAA, Nepali officials and CAMC worked together to raise the project cost using fake bills, overpricing, and low-quality materials. Investigators say Nepal lost around USD 74.34 million between 2018 and 2024 due to these actions. The agency also says that a review committee and several engineering professors supported cost increases without proper study, which helped justify a contract expansion to USD 244.04 million, far higher than the earlier approved cost of USD 145 million.
The case is based partly on a parliamentary report that found more than USD 75 million in irregularities. That report pointed to inflated costs, issues in runway construction, misuse of tax exemptions, and suspicious payments in consulting and fuel storage work. After receiving the report, the CIAA carried out a detailed investigation and prepared the charge sheet.
Pokhara International Airport was completed in 2022, funded through a USD 216 million loan from China Exim Bank. Nepal is supposed to pay back this loan using airport income, but the airport has not been able to generate enough traffic. Since opening in 2023, it has only one weekly international flight and has faced technical problems, including runway limitations.
The project itself has been troubled for decades. First planned in 1971, it faced delays due to political instability, public objections, and disagreements about cost and land studies. In 2011, a secret agreement involving a former finance minister raised doubts about whether the bidding process favoured Chinese companies. Later, all bids for the project came from firms selected by China Exim Bank.
A separate international investigation in 2023 revealed problems including unfinished construction work, missing amenities that were marked as complete, and unpaid taxes worth USD 16 million.
With additional three related probes still ongoing and recent protests against corruption, the issue has shown Nepal’s struggle in handling of large infrastructure projects and the financial risks linked to foreign-backed loans.
