The leaders at a meeting of the subcommittee formed under the Constitutional Committee (CC) to settle the disputes in constitution writing reached the agreement on Thursday. [break]Prime Minister Jhalanath Khanal, UCPN (Maoist) Chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal, former Prime Minister Madhav Kumar Nepal and Nepali Congress (NC) parliamentary party leader Ram Chandra Paudel, among others, attended the meeting.
The leaders also decided not to mention the year of promulgation in the name of new constitution as practiced in the past.
Earlier the parties had failed to finalize the name as various political parties suggested different names. Out of the 10 options, the name "The Constitution of Nepal-2010" had secured a majority votes when the CC conducted vote on the issue in December 2009. In the 64-member CC, 31 members from the Nepali Congress (NC), the CPN-UML, Tarai-Madhes Democratic Party (TMDP) and MPRF (D), among others, stood in favor of the name while 22 members, including Maoists, voted against it and one member remained neutral. The Maoists had proposed "The Constitution of the People´s Federal Republic of Nepal-2010" as the name of the new constitution.
The leaders also agreed to settle the row over mentioning the words ´Maoist combatants´ in the new constitution by remaining silent on the matter. "As the parties have agreed to promulgate the new constitution only after concluding the peace process, there is no point mentioning the words Maoist combatants," said UML lawmaker Agni Kharel, adding, "Therefore, we at the meeting decided to remain silent on Maoist combatants."
Earlier, Maoist leaders were insisting on describing Maoist combatants as People´s Liberation Army (PLA) while members from other parties objected to the use of the words in the statute.
"With the resolution of these issues, we have become able to reduce the number of contentious issues from 30 to 22," said Maoist chief whip Post Bahadur Bogati.
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