During a joint meeting of the party´s CWC members and lawmakers organized by its Central Policy Orientation Academy on Thursday, the NC leaders argued that the party should hold negotiations with various other parties and ethnic organizations to persuade them over the NC´s position. [break]
The meeting comes against the background of the State Restructuring Commission (SRC) submitting two separate reports to the government on federal state structure.
Addressing the meeting, NC CWC member and lawmaker Gagan Thapa argued that the NC cannot afford to remain a back-bencher and only react to the federal models floated by others.
“We have already agreed to go for federalism. We now have a situation where we in the Nepali Congress can ourselves develop a single federal state model through consensus,” he said.
He also suggested to the party leadership to start negotiations with other political parties and various ethnic organizations advocating ethnicity-based federal states to bring them around to the NC´s position.
NC lawmaker Uma Kanta Chaudhary asked the party to take a clear position on Madhes.
“The Nepali Congress has a popular base in Madhes. Our party would benefit hugely in the next election if it took a clear position on the federal state agenda in Madhes,” CWC member Jiwan Pariyar quoted Chaudhary as saying. Chaudhary added that the Madhesi people are in favor of a separate Madhes federal state.
Also speaking on the occasion, N P Saud asked the party to recognize the entire far western region as a single federal state as demanded by the local people. Likewise, Mohammad Siddhiqi asked the party to think about ensuring the rights of minority groups while delineating the federal states.
At the outset, NC leader Narahari Acharya briefed the meeting about the two separate reports presented by the SRC to the government.
The NC had invited two experts --Surya Lal Amatya and Prithivi Raj Ligal--to the meeting to put forth their views on federalism. According to CWC member Pariyar, Amatya said it was good news that one of the two reports suggested delineating only six federal states. Amatya also suggested not to go for federal structures based on ethnicity.
Likewise, Ligal suggested that the federal states should be based strictly on economic viability and not on ethnic identity. He presented figures showing that none of the proposed federal states was economically viable.
Related story
On ethnic federalism
