Two men were arrested in Nepal after police identified them in a widely shared video that appears to show gold earrings being removed from the body of a woman swept downstream during the catastrophic August floods.

Chitwan Police identified the suspects as 25-year-old Madan Gurung and 38-year-old Umesh Chaudhary. Both were taken into custody on August 27 after investigators used the circulating footage to identify them, according to Nepali news outlets citing the District Police Office in Chitwan.

Video showed men handling a flood victim’s body

The 41-second recording shows several people gathered around a woman’s body in muddy floodwater and debris. Two men can be seen using wooden poles while handling the body, and one of them appears to remove earrings from the woman’s ears. Other people stand nearby, with some recording the scene on their phones.

Nepal Police later shared the footage through its official social-media account while announcing that the men seen in the video had been taken into custody. Local reporting said the victim had been swept downstream after the severe flooding that struck the Bhotekoshi-Trishuli river system.

Content warning: The embedded video below shows a deceased flood victim and the apparent removal of jewelry from her body.

Police identified two suspects and opened an investigation

OnlineKhabar and Khabarhub reported that Gurung is originally from Binayi Tribeni in Nawalparasi and had been staying in Chitwan, while Chaudhary is originally from Sunsari and was also living in the Chitwan area. Police said both men were identified from the video and taken to the District Police Office for further investigation.

Chitwan Police Chief SP Rameshwar Paudel said authorities would not tolerate looting or other inhumane acts targeting disaster victims or the deceased. Police also urged the public to report evidence of theft or abuse involving victims recovered during the disaster.

Some international coverage described the case as involving formal charges for robbery or desecration. The Nepali reports reviewed by Deep Gore Tube, however, said the two men had been detained and were under investigation. Those sources did not confirm that formal criminal charges had already been filed at the time of publication.

The arrests came during a rapidly worsening flood disaster

The case unfolded as Nepal was dealing with one of the region’s most destructive flood disasters in years. Radio Nepal reported, citing Nepal Police, that the death toll had reached 469 by the morning of August 28. Bodies had been recovered across multiple districts, including Chitwan, after floodwaters carried victims far downstream.

Regional casualty figures changed rapidly as rescue and recovery operations continued. Some contemporaneous reports combined missing-person totals from Nepal with those from Tibet in China, so figures for people still unaccounted for should not be treated as a Nepal-only count without attribution.

The video drew intense public anger because the alleged theft occurred while families and emergency crews were still searching for victims. The arrests show how social-media footage can become evidence in a criminal investigation, but the case remained under investigation when the suspects were detained.

ARTICLE CREDIT: News story written by Kat News.

Sources / Further reading:

Zee News: https://zeenews.india.com/world/nepal-flood-corpse-gold-theft-viral-video-arrests-3068749.html

Nepal Police on X: https://x.com/NepalPoliceHQ/status/2092950217138339990

OnlineKhabar: https://english.onlinekhabar.com/arrested-stealing-earring-dead-body.html

Khabarhub: https://english.khabarhub.com/2026/27/565185/

Radio Nepal: https://radionepalonline.com/en/2026/08/28/434913.html

Al Jazeera: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/8/28/nearly-470-killed-in-nepal-floods-what-we-know-about-rescue-efforts