Sanjeeb Phuyal is the Nepali Editor of Newschecker based in Kathmandu, Nepal. He brings over a decade of experience writing and editing news. In his previous stint, he worked as online editor for The Kathmandu Post. With the growth of social media platforms—and the ever-growing competition amongst media outlets to churn out breaking news, he feels that fact-checking every piece of information has become more essential today than ever before.
The infamous rape and subsequent murder of Nirmala Panta, a teenaged girl from Kanchanpur, shocked the country in July 2018, and the case has still remained a mystery. Nirmala Panta went missing on July 26, and her body was recovered, the next morning, from a sugarcane field near her home in Kanchanpur district. The grisly incident became a national issue and sparked country-wide protests by human rights activists after the police failed to arrest the perpetrators involved in the crime. In this context, a video claiming that the man involved in the rape and murder of Nirmala Panta has been arrested in Kathmandu has been shared on Facebook. The thumbnail text of the video also claims that the newly appointed Home Minister, who is also a deputy prime minister, came as a god. Newschecker found the claim to be false.
A Facebook user Deepak Maharjan posted a YouTube video on December 31 with the thumbnail text reading, “The killer of Nirmala Panta has been arrested from Kathmandu. Rabi has emerged as a god. Justice has been delivered. The murder has been made public today itself.” The post has also been shared on another Facebook page named TikTok Nepal.
The video has garnered 161 reactions and 11 people have commented on it until the time of publishing this article. The video was originally posted on the YouTube channel named Ktm Khabar and has garnered 1.4k likes and 71 people have commented on it.
Rastriya Swatantra Party President Rabi Lamichhane, whose newly formed party emerged as the fourth largest political force in the recently held general elections, was appointed as Deputy Prime Minister and Home Minister on December 26. Right after his appointment as Home Minister, Lamichhane said that he would bring the perpetrators of Nirmala Panta rape and murder case to justice.
Fact Check /Verification
To check the authenticity of the claim made in the video, Newschecker thoroughly listened to the video posted on KTM Khabar and found that the news was poorly presented, and there was nothing new despite the text on the lower part of the screen reading, “Today’s main news and breaking news.” This gave us the indication that it was a clickbait video without any attribution to its sources.
Further, we searched for the latest news regarding the investigation of Nirmala Panta’s murder using relevant keywords. We found a report published on New Business Age online. According to the news article, Nepal Police on December 31 formed a five-member probe committee under Deputy Inspector General (DIG) Puja Singh to look into the rape-and-murder of Nirmala Panta following the directive of Home Minister Rabi Lamichhane.
The case had drawn public attention in January 2022 after police arrested an Indian citizen for interrogation in connection with the incident. The long- drawn-out case remained a mystery despite a series of investigations by police teams from the Central Bureau of Investigation, Provincial Police Office and District Police Office.
Our findings show that no leads has been found to solve the rape-and-murder of Nirmala Panta and the culprit has not been arrested as of January 3, 2023.
Conclusion
The video claiming that the perpetrator of Nirmala Panta rape and murder case has been arrested from Kathmandu is false.
Result: False
Sources
Deepak Maharjan /Facebook
TikTok Nepal /Facebook
New Business Age online
My Republica Online
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Sanjeeb Phuyal is the Nepali Editor of Newschecker based in Kathmandu, Nepal. He brings over a decade of experience writing and editing news. In his previous stint, he worked as online editor for The Kathmandu Post. With the growth of social media platforms—and the ever-growing competition amongst media outlets to churn out breaking news, he feels that fact-checking every piece of information has become more essential today than ever before.
