Paris, March 27 (IANS) External Affairs Minister (EAM) S Jaishankar on Friday extended wishes to Shisir Khanal for taking over as Nepal’s Minister for Foreign Affairs and expressed readiness to work with him to further strengthen partnership between the two nations.
“Warm wishes to Shisir Khanal on taking over as the Minister for Foreign Affairs of Nepal. Look forward to working closely with him to further strengthen our traditional partnership,” EAM Jaishankar posted on X.
Khanal was appointed as Nepal’s Minister of Foreign Affairs after Balendra Shah, the parliamentary party leader of the Rastriya Swatantra Party (RSP), was sworn in as the new Prime Minister of Nepal on Friday afternoon.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi also congratulated Shah on being sworn in as Nepal’s Prime Minister and expressed readiness to work with him to take the friendship between the two nations to greater heights for the benefit of citizens of both countries.
On Thursday, the RSP, which secured a sweeping victory in the recent parliamentary elections with a near two-thirds majority, elected Shah as its parliamentary party leader, paving the way for him to become the country’s 47th Prime Minister.
The 35-year-old former Kathmandu Mayor is one of the youngest Prime Ministers Nepal has ever had. A majority of lawmakers elected in the recent elections represent younger age groups, marking a generational shift in Nepal’s politics.
A popular figure among the younger generation, Shah’s entry into national politics on December 28 last year is believed to have contributed to a swing in votes for the RSP. The nearly four-year-old party ran its election campaign by declaring Shah as its Prime Ministerial candidate and secured a thumping victory in the March 5 parliamentary elections, winning 182 out of 275 seats in the House of Representatives.
Shah defeated former Prime Minister K P Sharma Oli by a wide margin of 49,614 votes, securing 68,348 votes against Oli’s 18,734 in Jhapa-5 in eastern Nepal. This marks the highest number of votes secured by any candidate in Nepal’s parliamentary elections since 1991.
Shah entered politics in 2022, when he ran for Mayor of Kathmandu and won as an independent candidate.
Ties between India and Nepal are defined by deep-rooted people-to-people links as well as commonalities in religion, language and culture. India is the largest development partner of Nepal, with the major portion of our development assistance focussed on large scale infrastructure projects under grants, according to Indian Embassy in Nepal. India has been active in extending development assistance to Nepal since the 1950s.
–IANS
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