The government on Friday has freed over a dozen opposition leaders from custody.

According to reports, the authorities have lifted the order of ‘house arrest’ of former deputy prime minister and senior CPN (UML) leader, Bharat Mohan Adhikari.

Half a dozen leaders including Adhikari were placed on house arrest since last Friday.

The order of ‘house arrest’ has been lifted against all the senior opposition leaders including Nepali Congress president GP Koirala except CPN (UML) general secretary Madhav Kumar Nepal.

Mr. Nepal is still confined at his residence at Koteswore, Kathmandu.

The opposition leaders freed on Friday include Govinda Raj Joshi, Khum Bahadur Khadka, Mahesh Acharya and Lekhnath Neupane of Nepali Congress; Siddhi Lal Singh and Raghuji Panta of CPN (UML); Khem Raj Bhatta `Mayalu,’ Keshav Kumar Budhathoki and Jivan Bahadur Shahi of NC (Democratic) and a trade union activist, Manju Bhattarai, among others.

Talking to Nepalnews Friday evening upon his release, UML leader and former minister Raghuji Panta said health condition of most of the detainees at the Armed Police Force base at Duwakot, Bhaktapur – where he was being detained– was deteriorating due to unhygienic water. He said acting president of NC (D) Gopal Man Shrestha and UML leaders Keshav Badal and Rajendra Shrestha had fallen ill due to the unhygienic drinking water.

“We were given three dailies– the state-run Gorkhapatra, The Rising Nepal, and private-sector Rajdhani daily — and three weeklies Jana Bhavana, Jana Dharana and Nispakchhya only to read while in custody,” Panta said.

He said the security personnel did not allow the detainees to newspapers including Kantipur and The Kathmandu Post—that are quite critical of the government—despite repeated requests.