bagmati

SUSHIL KOIRALA MEETS OWN PARTY LEADERS BEFORE

EMBARKING ON INDIA VISIT

Kathmandu, 3 Aug.: NC President Sushil Kiirala s holding internal party

discussions Saturday ahead of his India visit Sunday.

Koirala held discussions with RPP Chairman Surya Bahadur Thapa

Friday.

The nC chief is meeting President Dr Ram Baran Yadav before embarking on a India visit for talks with top Indian leaders and officials.

Koirala is visiting India immediately after UML senior leader Madhav Kumar Nepal visit; Sher Bahadur Deuba held talks with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Sonia Gandhi when he visited New Delhi before Koirala.

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HLPM MEETS SATURDAY

Kathmandu, 3 Aug.: HLPM is meeting for the second consecutive day aturday to discuss contentious issues and  creating an election environment by holding

separate talks with opposition.

Talks were inconclusive Friday,

Demands have been made for expansion of the constituent assembly by constituents of four parties behind government while women have also demanded secured seats in the assembly.

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COMMISSION TENURE ENDS

Kathmandu, 3 Aug.: The extended 10-day tenure of a five-member constituency delineation commission to suggest recommentations for re-drawing 240 electoral

constituencies for the November elections ends Saturday.

Another 10-day extension has been sought as work is yet to be completed.

The government extension is likely to come Sunday after

offices reopen after the weekend.

The fice-member commission is headed by retired supreme court justice

Tariq Ali Ansari.

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BAGMATI MAHOTSAV BEING HELD SATURDAY

Kathmandu, 3 Aug.: Bagmatio Mahotsav or a campaign to clean Bagmati

 river is being held Saturday.

The campaign is an effort to raise awareness to restore health of the

polluted river still considered holy.

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NEPALI STUDENTS RETURN HOME WITH DARJEELING BANDH

Kathmandu, 3 Aug.: The Gorkha Janamukti Morcha (GJM) has announced the second phase of its protest, demanding a separate state of Gorkhaland in the Darjeeling Hills in West Bengal, India. The party has announced an indefinite strike in the Hills, beginning
Saturday, Parbat Portel writes in The Kathmandu Post from Kakadbhitta.

After India’s ruling coalition, the United Progressive Alliance (UPA), endorsed a separate Telangana state by bifurcating Andhra Pradesh very recently, the GJM renewed its agitation for the separate state for the Nepali speaking population in West Bengal.
The Gorkhaland movement spearheaded by the GJM had ebbed after a tripartite agreement signed on July 18, 2011, that had put in place the Gorkhaland Territorial Administration (GTA), an autonomous elected council to look after the affairs of the Darjeeling Hills.
Immediately after the Telangana decision, GJM Chairman Bimal Gurung resigned as the chief of the GTA and announced the agitation by calling a three-day general strike in Darjeeling on Monday.
Gurung has claimed that the movement this time will be a ‘decisive one’ and that they will only settle for a separate state.
The WB state government has decided to mobilise the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) to contain the GJM protest.
In view of the tensions in the Darjeeling Hills that is likely to escalate in the coming days, students going to schools in places like Darjeeling, Kurseong and Kalimpong from other places have started leaving the troubled Hills.
Most students from outside Darjeeling district and studying in St Joseph’s School have either left or are planning to leave Darjeeling, school principal Fr Santy Mathews said. The school has 120 Nepali students, 60 Bhutanese, 40 Thai and 10 from Hong Kong.
Similarly, St Paul’s School has students from as far as America, Holland and Jordan. Students from other places in India and from Bhutan also left Darjeeling on Friday. Uday Shrestha, a travel agent here, said around 200 Nepali students entered the country via the Kakadbhitta border in the last two days alone.
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DAMAGED ROAD TO DARHULAA YET TO BE RESTORED
Kathmandu, 3 Aug.: A month into the reconstruction and repair work, a 5-km section of the Baitati-Darchula road , which was damaged by landslides and floods this year, is yet to
be completed, Khagendra Awasthi writes in The Kathmandu Post from Baithati..
Residents of Darchula are facing a shortage of essentials due to the obstruction, while many organisations are finding it hard to supply relief materials to people affected by floods that hit the region on June 16.
Locals have accused the Road Division Office, Baitadi, of delaying the work. The division office said around 1-km of the road was swept away by a floods on June 16, while the road has been damaged at nine places by landslides. Chief of the division office, Sanjaya Kumar Shrestha, said a 5-km stretch of the road must be repaired and reconstructed. He said explosive materials are needed to break rocks at Khettebagar. “Explosive materials and compressor machines have just arrived and we will start the work soon,” he said.
He said that although vehicles will ply up to Kiptadi in 10 to 15 days, they will take some more days to complete the entire reconstruction and repair work up to Khalanga.
Work at Masinbaluwa at Dhap, that had been stopped 15 days ago after machines broke down, resumed on Tuesday.
An estimated Rs 75. 6 million will be spent in entire repair work.

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