KATHMANDU, August 27: Hridayesh Tripathi, who became the Minister for Federal Affairs and General Administration and also the Minister for Health and Population in the erstwhile KP Oli-led government, is preparing to form a new party soon.

Tripathi said the new party would be announced by mid-September. "We will form a new party within mid-September," Tripathi said. "It has been decided to form a new party." However, Tripathi did not want to mention the name of the party.

According to sources, the word socialist will not be omitted in the name of the party to be formed by Tripathi. The source added that he has made the name 'Nepal Samajbadi Party' his first priority. "While selecting the names, we will see if the name will clash with the parties that are already registered at the Election Commission," Tripathi said, “Whatever the name will be, we have already decided to form a new party.”

Tripathi and his group now call themselves an independent political group. The group has two members of the House of Representatives and two provincial assembly members. Tripathi and Brijesh Gupta are the MPs in the HoR while Ajay Shahi and Dharma Bahadur Lal Srivastava are the members of the Provincial Assembly. The group also includes Pashupatidayal Mishra and Ishwardayal Mishra. The leaders of this group had contested the 2017 election to the House of Representatives and the provincial assembly under the CPN-UML's ‘Sun’ symbol. Therefore, the UML leaders claim that they are still legally considered UML.

Although Tripathi announced the formation of a new party, leaders of his group said they were not aware of it. Bijresh Gupta, a leader of the Tripathi group, said he did not know about the new party. Similarly, another leader Ajay Shahi also said that he was not aware of the formation of the new party. "I also heard from the media that a new party is being formed but I am not aware of it," he said.

 
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