The newly appointed defense minister Bidya Devi Bhandari has approved a proposal from army chief Rookmangud Katawal seeking job extension of eight brigadier generals, reports say.

The new government is preparing to revoke the previous government’s decision to pension off the generals through a cabinet decision, sources say.

A case on the extension the generals’ term is pending at the Supreme Court. On Sunday the SC postponed its pre-scheduled hearing on the case for an indefinite period.

A division bench of Justices Tap Bahadur Magar and Mohan Prakash Sitoula deferred the hearing after they received a letter from the Office of the Attorney General (AG). The OAG, in turn, received instructions from the defense ministry to do so.

The Maoist-led government had pensioned off brigadier generals Nara Bahadur Kandel, Narendra Bahadur Rawal, Kumar Budhathoki, Pawan Bahadur Pandey, Pradip Bikram Rana, Shiva Kumar Poudel, Ramesh Bista and Raju Pratap KC in March. nepalnews.com Jun 01 09