Kathmandu: Chief Secretary Dr. Baikuntha Aryal, along with 11 government employees and a private company, has been sued for corruption related to the procurement of excise duty stickers.

The Commission for Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA) filed the case at the Special Court, seeking Rs 386 million in recovery from each involved party, according to court spokesperson Dhan Bahadur Karki.

Dr. Aryal, who served as the chairman of the security printing development committee during his tenure as the Secretary at the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology, is among those charged.

Other key figures named in the case include Ritesh Kumar Shakya, the then Director General of the Inland Revenue Department and now Joint Secretary at the Finance Ministry, Tanka Prasad Pande, the then Deputy Director General at the Inland Revenue Department and currently Deputy Director General at the Customs Department, and Bikal Paudel, the then Executive Director of the Security Printing Centre.

Additional defendants include Ganesh Bikram Shahi, Rabindra Prasad Paudel, Safal Shrestha, Hari Ballav Ghimire, Bishnu Prasad Gautam, and Shakti Prasad Shrestha, all employees from various sections of the Inland Revenue Department, General Administration Section, Procurement Unit, and National IT Centre. Keshav Sharma, the director of Print Sell, the company contracted for printing the excise duty stickers, has also been charged.