Kathmandu, Nepal: The third meeting of the Members of the Eminent Persons Group (EPG) from Nepal and India has begun in Kathmandu on Wednesday to discuss over bilateral issues between the neighboring countries.
Though the Nepal-India EPG was formed in 2014 with the jurisdictions even to replace, update, or scrape the 1950’s historic treaty signed between the two neighboring counties on the basis of new context, the EPG has done nothing yet except holding discussions.
It seems that the third meeting would not bear any fruits as of former two meetings. Nepal has to raise the issues to scrape discriminatory provisions of the 1950 treaty but Nepal has been hesitating to forward the issue as the agendas of the meeting.
It was claimed that EPG had already decided to revise all the bilateral agreements and arrangements between the two countries starting with the 1950 treaty.
But Nepal has not made any preparation to revise the agreements, thanks to the India for not willing to revise the discriminatory provisions. The third meeting of Nepal-India EPG had been put off two times in the past as India had a fear that Nepal would raise the issue in the meeting.
As per the agreement reached between the two countries in 2011 to establish the EPG, the two countries had agreed to prepare its terms of reference in 2014. Since then just two meetings one in Kathmandu and another in New Delhi of India were held just to formalize the decision to establish the EPG.
The EPG, Dr Bhekh Bahadur Thapa, Nilamber Acharya, Rajan Bhattarai and Surya Nath Upadhyay are representing Nepal whereas Bhagat Singh Koshyari, Jayant Prasad, BC Upreti and Mahendra P. Lama are representing the India.
