Corruption in Nepal shows no sign of going down, as substantiated by the corruption perceptions index (CPI) made public by Transparency International on Tuesday. According to the latest study of the international organisation, Nepal scored just 34 of 100, which is a poor performance. The country, which scored 35 and ranked 108th out of 180 countries last year, is now in the 107th position. The global average remains 43 this year, while a country scoring less than 50 is considered to have relatively more corruption. Nepal in the past decade has been far below the mark.

The CPI report paints a bleak picture of Nepal’s governance. In the review period, CPN (Maoist Centre) chair Pushpa Kamal Dahal was prime minister until mid-July 2024 and then CPN-UML chief KP Sharma Oli, current prime minister, replaced him. “I don’t indulge in corruption and I don’t tolerate it” is the most repeated refrain from the current prime minister. However, several decisions of the Oli-led government have come under question. The decision to build his party’s central office with funds from a controversial businessman and the Giribandhu Tea Estate scam related to the illegal use of land exceeding the prescribed ceiling are the latest corruption cases linked to the prime minister.

Seven months after being ousted from Singhadurbar, Dahal has not stopped complaining how the two largest parties—the Nepali Congress and the CPN-UML—plotted his removal because of his “campaign against corruption”. Though he boasts of waging a war against corruption in his last stint as prime minister, people are not convinced. When Dahal, chief of the third-largest party, lectures about his “crusade on good governance” from the party’s podiums, he is mostly flanked by leaders like Krishna Bahadur Mahara, who was implicated in a gold smuggling case and later released by the court on general date.

Dahal’s once comrade-in-arms and former prime minister Baburam Bhattarai announced in public platforms how Dahal embezzled billions of rupees during the insurgency as well as while heading the government multiple times. The Rastriya Swatantra Party emerged as the fourth largest in the House of Representatives in 2022 in a dramatic way. The party’s major agenda of corruption control and good governance impressed common people and helped the new force catapult to power. But the president of the three-year-old party, Rabi Lamichhane, has now been suspended as a lawmaker and faces cases in five districts on charges of embezzling millions of rupees deposited by commoners in several cooperatives.

Some senior leaders of the Congress party, the largest in Parliament, such as former home minister Balkrishna Khand, who was in detention on the charge of involvement in sending Nepalis as fake Bhutanese to the United States, was released on bail in December last year. Even some key Nepali politicians who seemed to have a clean image such as former prime ministers Madhav Kumar Nepal and Baburam Bhattarai are not above the question. These leaders who lead two small parties have been accused of policy decisions that helped officials and middlemen to illegally sell government land at Lalita Niwas. Though the CIAA and other investigating agencies have made some effort to contain corruption, they have so far not dared to catch big fish.

In sum, corruption is deep-rooted and needs to be cleansed from the top. Nepal sees a form of uprising around every 10 years. However, Nepalis have hardly any political cause left to revolt. But public frustration with corruption, mismanagement, and bad governance is reaching a boiling point. Sooner the leaders heed the call, better for their longevity. Otherwise they will be unknowingly digging their own political grave.