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Kathmandu, Jan 26: More than 1,000 corruption-related case files were destroyed in an arson attack at the Supreme Court during the Gen Z movement.

The files had been summoned during appeal hearings after the Special Court delivered verdicts in cases filed by the Commission for the Investigation of Abuse of Authority. The Special Court has circulated a notice seeking the status of corruption files that reached the Supreme Court on December 31, 2025.

Officials say over 20,000 pending cases and nearly 5,000 cases awaiting full verdict texts were damaged or destroyed in the September 24 fire. Recovery and verification of burned documents are under way at the Supreme Court and other courts.

Supreme Court administration said files of ongoing cases, cases decided but awaiting full text, cases under verdict execution, and archived records were affected. In corruption cases, both the CIAA and defendants had appealed, leading the Special Court to send original files to the Supreme Court.

Special Court Registrar Bed Prasad Upreti said 1,069 corruption case files were sent to the Supreme Court during appeal proceedings. He said the court recently sought updates and fears only about 100 files may have survived. He warned of serious concern, as the Special Court does not keep duplicate archives. Its software system was also damaged in the fire.

Supreme Court spokesperson Arjun Koirala said assessments are ongoing to determine how many files were destroyed or remain intact and details will be shared after verification.

There are also fears that records of corruption cases already decided and sent to district courts for implementation were lost. Along with the Supreme Court and Special Court, 14 district courts were damaged, including Kathmandu, Morang, Chitwan, Kaski, Tanahun and Banke.

As of January 14, the Special Court had pending cases, including 14 illicit wealth charges and 86 irregularity cases.

People’s News Monitoring Service