Kathmandu: Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli’s recent anti-India remarks and claim that efforts are being made to oust him after his government redrew Nepal’s political map has backfired, with top leaders of the ruling Nepal Communist Party demanding his resignation Tuesday.
As soon as the powerful Standing Committee meeting of the Nepal Communist Party started at the Prime Minister’s Official residence at Baluwatar Tuesday, former prime minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal ‘Prachanda’ slammed Prime Minister Oli for the remarks he made Sunday.
“The Prime Minister’s remarks that India was conspiring to remove him was neither politically correct, nor diplomatically appropriate,” he said. “Such a statement by the Prime Minister may damage our relations with the neighbour,” he warned.
Prime Minister Oli, 68, Sunday claimed that there have been various kinds of activities in the ‘embassies and hotels’ to remove him from power. He said some Nepalese leaders were also involved in the game.
Accusing the southern neighbour and leaders of his own party by the Prime Minister was not appropriate, a senior leader of the party quoted Prachanda as saying during the meeting.
Prachanda told Oli that it was not India but him who had been seeking his resignation both as party chair and prime minister, the NCP leader said.
Besides Prachanda, senior leaders Madhav Kumar Nepal, Jhalanath Khanal, Bamdev Gautam and Narayankaji Shrestha also asked Prime Minister Oli to provide evidence of his accusation and asked to quit the power, he said.
What the Prime Minister spoke was objectionable and inappropriate, they said. They also asked the Prime Minister to name the leaders who were behind the conspiracy to remove him.
They said the Prime Minister should resign on moral grounds as he spoke such “undiplomatic and nonpolitical remarks.” However, the Prime Minister who was also present at the meeting, did not make any comment.
Prachanda has time and again spoken about the lack of coordination between the government and the party and he was pressing for a one-man one position system to be followed by the NCP.
Nepal this month completed the process of redrawing the country’s political map through a Constitutional amendment, incorporating Lipulekh, Kalapani and Limpiyadhura areas which India maintains belong to it.
India has termed as ‘untenable’ the ‘artificial enlargement’ of the territorial claims by Nepal.
The India-Nepal bilateral ties came under strain after Defence Minister Rajnath Singh inaugurated a 80-km-long strategically crucial road connecting the Lipulekh pass with Dharchula in Uttarakhand May 8.