A meeting of the committee held on August 4 had asked all the 25 political parties to submit suggestions on the number of states, a map with boundaries of provinces along with a concept paper to the committee by Sunday.
The committee in writing had informed the parties that no discussion will be held on the maps and concept papers submitted after Sunday.
But leaders from the major political parties in a meeting of the committee on Friday requested committee chairman Lokendra Bista Magar to extend the deadline for submission of the concept papers.
Gopal Man Shrestha of Nepali Congress (NC) was the first man to propose extension of deadline. Dr Mangal Siddhi Manandhar of CPN-UML and Pratibha Rana of the Rashtriya Prajatantra Party supported Shrestha´s proposal. Following the request, the chairman asked the parties to submit the concept papers as soon as possible.
Though several members of the committee have submitted maps for proposed provinces, no major political party has so far submitted the official concept paper and maps of provinces to be delineated under federal set up.
Gopal Kiranti of Unified CPN (Maoist), Shrestha and Narahari Acharya of NC and Dr Manandhar and Shankar Pokharel of CPN-UML earlier submitted their maps for discussion in the committee. Likewise, Anil Jha of Sadbhavana Party, Buddha Ratna Manandhar of Nepa Rashtriya Party and a member from Madhesi People´s Rights Forum (Democratic) also have presented their maps in the committee. Also, a member of the Rashtriya Janamorcha, which opposes federalism, has also submitted a concept of dividing the country into seven administrative provinces.
The major political parties are still holding discussions on finalizing the maps. Unified CPN (Maoist) organized a workshop on Saturday for giving final shape to its map.
CPN-UML is holding a party meeting to discuss its map on August 12. "We will submit our draft in about a week," Manandhar told myrepublica.com.
The NC leaders say the party has lately intensified discussions on the matter but is yet to come up with a final version.
CA Chairman Subash Nembang has urged the parties to present their draft reports no later than August 31, as the deliberations on all concepts and draft reports must be concluded by September 6 and sent to the Constitutional Committee (CC) by September 7 as per the amended CA calendar.
CA members have pressed the committee to complete its task soon as deliberations on the preliminary drafts prepared by other committees in the CA have become meaningless because many important issues described in the drafts are entirely dependent on state restructuring.
NC CA member Dr Ram Sharan Mahat in a CA meeting on Friday had described the ongoing deliberations like putting the cart before the horse. He said holding discussions on the drafts presented by other committees without first finalizing the governance system and the state restructuring is meaningless.
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