India MEA official Anurag Srivastava reaches Nepal, to hold series of meetings

The head of the Northern Division at the Ministry of External Affairs, Anurag Srivastava, arrived in Nepal on Tuesday, 28 September. An official from the Indian Mission in Nepal confirmed that the Srivastava arrived in Kathmandu and will now be holding series of discussions during his visit. He will also be participating in a meeting of the mechanism formed to oversee the execution and operationalisation of India funded projects. 

The official told ANI, “Series of meetings with secretaries at various ministries has been fixed for Wednesday.”

Another MEA official separately added, “He (Srivastava) will be participating in a meeting of mechanism formed to oversee the execution and operationalisation of India funded projects. Meetings with other officials are sideline meetings which have been taking occasionally in between the two nations but were stalled for few years attributing to various reasons.”

It is worth mentioning that Srivastava's visit to Nepal is the first visit by an Indian government official after Sher Bahadur Deuba succeeded KP Oli as Prime Minister. The relation between Nepal and the Indian government was bittered last year after the former had released the revised political and administrative map incorporating the disputed territories of Limpiyadhura, Lipulekh and Kalapani. At that time, India had said that Nepal's unilateral action was "not based on historical facts and evidence" and reiterated a solid objection to the hill country's move. 

Nepal acknowledges India’s continued support

However, earlier this month, Nepal acknowledged India for its continued support towards the infrastructural development of the Himalayan nation. India expressed its delight at the productive collaboration with the Nepal government and the joint efforts made towards strengthening connectivity infrastructure between the two countries.
The discourse took place during the 4th Joint Project Monitoring Committee on 'Strengthening of Road Infrastructure' in the Terai region of Nepal which was held through video-conferencing. 

Srivastava, along with the Joint Secretary from Ministry of Physical Infrastructure and Transport of Nepal Keshab Kumar Sharma co-chaired the fourth Joint Project Monitoring Committee (JPMC) meet. The meet evaluated the overall implementation of the Government of India-funded Terai Roads Project in Nepal while expressing pleasure at the satisfactory progress achieved with the fulfilment of 13 out of 14 road packages under the project. Both nations noted that despite the hazards posed by the COVID pandemic, the initiative has made good progress and has finally reached the final stage of completion.

(With inputs from ANI)