A meeting of the three major political parties in Singha Durbar on Sunday reached an understanding to this effect besides fixing the number (seven-member) of the members to be appointed in the SRC.[break]
They also decided to invite leaders from the UDMF in the next round of meeting on Monday morning and claimed that the meeting would be final with regard to constituting the commission.
According to leaders privy to the development Prime Minister Dr Baburam Bhattarai himself proposed to share four seats. “There has been an understanding among the leaders to allocate one member each for the three major political parties and one for the UDMF,” informed Tarai-Madhes Democratic Party (TMDP) Vice-chairman Hridayesh Tripathi, who is also the minister for physical planning and works.
The prime minister at the meeting had said at least the four political forces need to reach an understanding on the matter. “So, let´s appoint one member each from the three major parties and one from UDMF,” a leader quoted the prime minister as saying at the meeting. “And, let´s appoint at least three members from among independent and eminent anthropologists, sociologists, regional planners, demographers or linguists acceptable to all the sides.”
According to the participants, the names discussed during the meeting include noted regional planner and geographer Professor Pitambar Sharma, anthropologist Dr Ganeshman Gurung, Krishna Khanal, former Chief Secretary Bimal Koirala, retired secretaries Shreekant Regmi and Ram Binod Bhattarai, former ambassador Kedarbhakta Mathema, historian Ramesh Dhungel and Binod Bhattarai, who worked as an expert to prepare NC´s proposal on state restructuring.
However, some of the participants had objected to some of the proposed names. “If we appoint some of these candidates, the commission will not be able to bring the report on time because some of them need to study the country´s demography for at least two months,” a leader present at the meeting quoted UML leader Surendra Pandey as saying at the meeting.
Dr Ram Sharan Mahat of NC said they would pick the senior-most from among the proposed names as head of the body on the basis of consensus. Sharma and Gurung are the most anticipated candidates to vie for the post.
However, leaders from UDMF are likely to differ over the names proposed by the three major political parties. While Sharma seems acceptable to all the three major political parties, leaders from UDMF are likely to turn down his candidacy. “Sharma has remained rigid with regard to federating the country in a true sense,” Madhesi leaders said preferring anonymity.
They are likely to propose Krishna Hachhethu or Krishna Bhattachan or Parshuram Tamang as the head of the body. All the three experts are advocates of ethnic-based federal model. According to some Madhesi leaders, the likely candidates to be proposed by UDMF as members of the commission include columnist CK Lal and Surendra Mahato, vice-president of Nepal Bar Association.
“Today (Sunday), we fixed the number of members to be appointed and the terms of reference (ToR) of the commission. We have reached an agreement in principle on other major aspects of the body but discussions are still under way as we are yet to consult leaders from the Madhesi parties,” CPN-UML Chairman Jhalanath Khanal said emerging from the meeting.
He informed that the number of members in the commission would not exceed seven.
UCPN (Maoist) Secretary CP Gajurel said the leaders have agreed to prepare a roster of experts and each major political party will propose two or three names on behalf of their parties.
“Today, we could not finalize the names as the UDMF leaders were not present at the meeting and the prime minister is still holding informal discussions on the matter,” stated Gajurel.
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