Army Chief General M M Naravane’s three-day visit to Nepal starting on Tuesday and his meeting with Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli is likely to resolve the controversy over road construction in Uttarakhand. The road in Lipulekh in Uttarakhand was inaugurated in May leading to mass protests in Nepal and cooling down of relations between two traditional friends.
Defence Minister Rajnath Singh had inaugurated the road in May. It reduces the travel time to Kailash Mansarovar pilgrimage by several km.
Nepal said the road was constructed in its territory but New Delhi all along maintained it was well within its boundary and some kilometers away from the Line of Actual Control (LAC) with China there.
Besides mass protest, Nepal also issued a new map that showed Kalapani, Lipulekh and Limpiyadhura, all controlled by India, as part of Nepalese territory thereby heightening tension between the two countries.
In a seminar then, Naravane said the protests were being held at the behest of “someone else” in obvious reference to China. Taking exception to these comments by the Army Chief, Nepalese Defence Minister Ishwar Pokhrel had said they “hurt the sentiments of the Nepali Gurkha army personnel who lay down their lives to protect India.”
Besides holding talks about the entire gamut to bilateral ties, honouring the long standing convention between the armies of the two countries, President Vidya Devi Bhandari will “confer the honorary rank of general of the Nepali Army to Naravane in an investiture ceremony during this visit.
India and Nepal have time-tested strong defence and security ties, with regular exchanges and training programmes. Nearly 30,000 Gurkhas serve in seven regiments of the Indian Army.
The Army chief’s visit will see the two countries further ramping up the ties and explore ways to have more interactions including joint training and exchange of personnel for study visits to institutes in each other’s country, sources said here on Sunday.
In August, the two sides held a meeting of their oversight mechanism that oversees India-funded development projects and agreed to speed up work on bilateral projects, including infrastructure schemes and cross-border rail links. It was the first step by the two countries to mend their relations and get down to business.
Coming days may see both the sides holding talks to speed up the Pancheshwar multi-purpose project on river Mahakali and other hydro-electric projects with India.
Also, India may also work closely with Nepal in the fields of education, health and infrastructure development sectors in Nepal.
