Starting an anti-corruption crusade

Prem Kumar Rai’s recent steps are praiseworthy, provided they come with no strings attached.

In recent months, there has been a sudden pickup in filing of corruption cases by the Commission for the Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA), which for years has come under heavy criticism for only going after the small fry and turning a blind eye to the big fish. This time around, two of the charges link big names. One involves Madhav Kumar Nepal, former prime minister, current chairman of the Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Socialist) and one-time general secretary of the Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist-Leninist), and the other Mohan Bahadur Basnet, Nepali Congress lawmaker and former minister.