Kathmandu, August 24
While Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba is on a state visit to India, it has been revealed that Nepal wanted to ‘revise’ the ‘structure’ of the Eminent Persons’ Group on Nepal-India Relations, which was mandated to recommend revisions to bilateral treaties and agreements.
Nepal and India formed the EPG comprising four persons from each side and gave a deadline of two years to come up with concrete suggestions. However, when the Nepali side was yet to return from the 2nd meeting of EPG from New Delhi in October last year, the Nepal government had begun discussions on replacing existing members with new ones.
The CPN-UML Chairman KP Sharma Oli-led government had formed the panel incorporating former foreign affairs minister Bhekh Bahadur Thapa, constitutional expert Nilamber Acharya, former bureaucrat Surya Nath Upadhyaya and lawmaker Rajan Bhattarai. It was believed that the members were loyal to the Nepali Congress and the UML.
After Oli government was toppled by the Congress-Maoist coalition, the Maoist Chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal headed the government, which could not take the panel into confidence. The coalition has continued as Nepali Congress President Sher Bahadur Deuba has been elected the PM, and sources say the trust deficit is still existing.
That is why PM Deuba did not consult them while finalising agendas of the significant India trip.
Then foreign affairs minister Prakash Sharan Mahat even made a public comment against the mechanism. Mahat today says, “They did not tell us in detail what they are doing.”
The EPG members claim the current ruling coalition accuses them of being close to the UML and hence has never consulted about what is going on.
In bilateral meetings, the Nepali side of EPG has taken stance on revising two points of the 1950 Peace and Friendship Treaty–about supply of arms and ammunition to Nepal from third countries and equal facilities to citizens of the two nations.
Experts of bilateral ties say the Nepali side’s stance is right, though India has not entertained it much.
