Foreign Secretary Misri Calls On Nepal’s New PM Oli As Border Issue Lingers

In a first such high-level attempt to reach out to the new dispensation in Kathmandu, New Delhi sent its top official Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri to meet Prime Minister KPS Oli even as sticky issues between both countries remain

New Delhi: Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri Sunday called on Prime Minister of Nepal KPS Oli, who came back to power for the fourth time on 15 July, even as New Delhi and Kathmandu continue to stare at a piling up of issues from the border dispute to revising the 1950 Indo-Nepal Peace and Friendship Treaty.

Foreign Secretary Misri left for Nepal on August 11. This was the first such high-level visit from India to Nepal since the change of dispensation in the Himalayan country.

“Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri called on Rt. Hon'ble Prime Minister of Nepal, Mr. K.P. Sharma Oli. FS reaffirmed India and Nepal’s civilizational, close and multifaceted relationship and discussed ways to provide an impetus to various sectors of bilateral cooperation,” said a statement by the Indian Embassy in Nepal.

In July, PM Oli was sworn in to power after his party Communist Party of Nepal-Unified Marxist Leninist (CPN-UML) formed an alliance with long-time rival Nepali Congress (NC), thereby showing the door to former PM Pushpa Kamal Dahal and his party CPN-Maoist Centre (CPN-MC).

On Sunday, the Foreign Secretary also inaugurated a new building of ‘Nepal Bhasha Parishad’ in Kathmandu jointly with Maniram Gelal, Secretary, Ministry of Urban Development. The building has been constructed under a post-earthquake reconstruction grant given by India.

India and Nepal will be holding delegation level talks on Monday.

New Delhi and Kathmandu had witnessed tensions creeping in the relationship that began rising since 2020 when Nepal then also under Oli went ahead and unilaterally changed its political map including in it the disputed territories of Kalapani, Lipulekh and Limpiyadhura.

Oli also made sure that the Constitution got amended to reflect the new map, which can also be found in their currency notes now. However, those disputed areas still persist on the ground.

India is yet to agree to a dialogue mechanism that will work towards resolving the border issue. However, the disputed territories that lie along the India-Nepal border in Uttarakhand continue to be under the control of Indian security forces.

Nepal has also been pushing India to revise the 1950 Indo-Nepal Peace and Friendship Treaty for which it had been urging New Delhi to adopt the report presented by an Eminent Persons’ Group (EPG), which is also pending.

Under the new political arrangement in Nepal, Oli will be the Prime Minister for the first two years, and thereafter the PM’s chair will be handed over to NC president Sher Bahadur Deuba for the remaining year and a half, until the next elections in November-December 2027.