KATHMANDU: The Samajbadi Party has decided to recall Sarita Giri as lawmaker and party member for defying the party’s decision to unanimously endorse the constitutional amendment to revise the national map of the country.

The Constitution amendment, which was aimed at updating the new administrative and political map of the country on the national emblem, was unanimously endorsed by the House of Representatives on June 18.
The SJP and the main Opposition Nepali Congress had backed the move by the government of Prime Minister K P Sharma Oli.
Contrary to her party’s official position on the endorsement of the new map, lawmaker Giri registered a separate amendment proposal at the Parliament Secretariat.
The Opposition Janata Samajbadi Party (JSP) decided to sack Sarita Giri for breaching the party whip to withdraw her amendment registered at the Parliament Secretariat against the Nepal government’s second amendment to the Constitution.
A three-member panel led by party general secretary Ram Sahay Prasad Yadav recommended that the party sack Sarita Giri from both as a lawmaker and the party member, and the meeting of the officer bearers of the party took the decision accordingly on Tuesday, said Bishwodip Pandey, deputy head of the party’s Publicity Department.
Giri had registered an amendment to the constitutional amendment bill registered by the government in Parliament on May 22. The bill was endorsed unanimously by both Houses of Parliament.
Giri had boycotted the Lower House after Speaker Agni Sapkota announced that her proposal had been scrapped as per Clause 112 of the House of Representatives’ regulations, which says that any amendment proposal to a bill cannot contradict the primary spirit of the bill.
Giri’s amendment to the bill had sought to retain the old map in the national emblem as there was no evidence to claim Limpiyadhura, Lipulekh and Kalapani as part of Nepal, she had argued.The Party had asked Giri to withdraw the amendment upon threat of internal action, but Giri had refused to do so.

The India-Nepal bilateral ties came under strain after Defence Minister Rajnath Singh inaugurated an 80-km-long strategically crucial road connecting the Lipulekh pass with Dharchula in Uttarakhand on May 8.
Nepal reacted sharply to the inauguration of the road claiming that it passed through Nepalese territory. India rejected the claim asserting that the road lies completely within its territory.
Nepal later released the revised political and administrative map of the country laying claim over the strategically key areas, more than six months after India published a new map in November 2019. India had then sternly asked Nepal not to resort to any “artificial enlargement” of territorial claims.
(With Agency Inputs).

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