King Gyanendra is a businessman. His major investment is in the Soaltee Group, one of the major business houses of the country running a few businesses. Though publicly his involvement in business is not seen, it’s a well-accepted truth. I don’t know how much the businesses are benefiting from his direct rule, but I can safely assume that they are probably doing the best business.
This shows that King Gyanendra thrive for property. After the Royal Massacre, he became the lone heir of all the properties accumulated by the Shah Dynasty during their 300 years of reign.
The latest information is about the properties once owned by the late King Birendra’s family. There is a piece of land in the prime space at Sallaghari of Bhaktapur meant for the palace constuction of late Prince Nirajan. The land was in name of Nirajan but King Gyanendra is the owner of that land. The land was tranferred to the King’s name 22 days after he took the executive power, according to an official who works in Land Revenue Office. Why in the King’s name?
Besides, late Princess Shruti owned a land at the prime space at Putali Sadak which was leased for 30 years to a businessman called Bahadur Singh Tamrakar. Tamrakar constructed a business plaza, called Kathmandu Plaza, there. The property should have been gone either to her husband or to her two little daughters, but it went to the present King’s daughter – Prerana. Is that good?
Besides people are also talking that other properties, shares and bonds held by members of late King Birendra’s family are transferred to present King’s family members. He is in power, there is no one to oppose, press are kept quiet – so he can do whatsoever he likes, but time will come when all these misdoings will be dug out – and he has to face the people then.
(Although these information come from reliable sources, they have not been cross verified.)
Special note on this entry:Radio Free Nepal was a blog that ran during ex-King Gyanendra’s direct rule of Nepal defying the tight censorship and was instrumental in getting out information out of Nepal. The blog was at freenepal.blogspot.com which has now been closed.
The banner reads: King Gyandendra of Nepal has issued a ban on independent news broadcasts and has threatened to punish newspapers for reports that run counter to the official monarchist line. Given that any person in Nepal publishing reports critical of “the spirit of the royal proclamation” is subject to punishment and/or imprisonment, contributors to this blog will publish their reports from Nepal anonymously.
