Congress Internal Dispute Escalates in Bagmati Province Government

Makwanpur. The internal conflict within the Nepali Congress has reached its peak in the Bagmati Province government. A faction led by Bahadur Singh Lama, the joint general secretary of the Congress, has started a siege against the government led by Indra Bahadur Baniyan, the provincial president of the Congress.

The former Chief Minister Lama-led faction has initiated the siege, centering it on a dispute over the budget. The Lama faction's MPs appear to have adopted a strategy of besieging the government led by their own party and preventing the budget from being passed.

The Lama faction, which has been maintaining a stance that they must leave the government before the end of Asar, has been holding continuous meetings in Kathmandu to pressure Chief Minister Baniyan.

They suspect that Chief Minister Baniyan will not step down after the budget is passed. Therefore, they have made the budget an instrument for changing the government.

Even if the Lama faction leaves the current alliance and forms an alliance with the CPN (UML), they maintain the stance that the leadership of the provincial government must change. The Lama faction's insistence on proceeding with the budget process only after the future of the government is decided makes it difficult for the government's budget to be passed. In Bagmati Province, the Congress leads the government, while the UML is in a role of power-sharing.

Due to the internal dispute within the Congress, the attendance of Congress MPs in the Provincial Assembly meetings has also thinned. According to the Provincial Assembly Secretariat, out of a total of 36 Congress MPs, 19 were present at the Provincial Assembly meeting called for discussions on the budget on Asar 16, 21 were present on Asar 17, and only 16 were present on Asar 18.

As the dispute escalated, Chief Minister Indra Bahadur Baniyan met with Congress Vice President Bishwaprakash Sharma in Kathmandu on Thursday. An MP stated that he informed Vice President Sharma about the political situation and the budget of the province and requested necessary support.

A Congress MP said that although the opposition MPs seem satisfied with the budget, the government is likely to face a crisis due to the non-cooperation of a faction within the ruling party. He stated that the Lama faction's stance is not about dissatisfaction with the budget itself, but with the leadership of the government, and they will not allow the budget to be passed until a concrete decision is made about the government.

“Even though the opposition MPs are happy with the budget, it’s not that the ruling party MPs are not included,” said another Congress MP. “There are some minor errors in the process of removing past weaknesses in the budget. Those can be rectified during implementation. However, the Lama faction has become active in creating difficulties for the government at the time of the budget.”

As the dispute escalated, Chief Minister Indra Bahadur Baniyan met with Congress Vice President Bishwaprakash Sharma in Kathmandu on Thursday. An MP stated that he informed Vice President Sharma about the political situation and the budget of the province and requested necessary support. After that meeting, it was decided that the Nepali Congress would send General Secretary Guru Baral to Hetauda with the responsibility of resolving the internal dispute in Bagmati Province, he said.

A parliamentary party meeting has been called at the Chief Minister's residence in Hetauda on Saturday, Asar 20, to resolve the dispute. The Bagmati Province Parliamentary Party of the Nepali Congress has stated that General Secretary Baral will be present and all MPs have been notified to attend mandatorily.

Finance and Planning Minister Prabhat Tamang presented a budget of 66 Arba 93 Crore 33 Lakh Rupees in the Provincial Assembly on Asar 1. Discussions on the budget have been ongoing since Asar 16. The Provincial Assembly Secretariat had scheduled the budget to be passed on Asar 19. However, the process of passing the budget is likely to be prolonged due to the conflict within the Congress.