India's one belt, one road to Nepal

New Delhi: India is likely to seek a rebalancing of ties with its northern neighbour Nepal, offering to help build an east-west railway line and give it better access to its ports as Nepal’s new prime minister and former Maoist rebel commander, Prachanda arrives in New Delhi, making India his first foreign stop. Talks between the Nepalese Prime Minister and Prime Minister Narendra Modi are scheduled for Friday morning.

Ties had chilled under his pro-China predecessor, K.P. Oli who had sealed trade deals that sought to reduce landlocked Nepal’s economic dependence on India. Prachanda said, on his four-day trip starting Thursday, that the two sides would discuss the Mechi-Mahakali railway line that India will help build.

The mountainous country has only one short rail line from Jaynagar on the Indian border to Janakpur. Another possible project, Prachanda said, was a hydro-electric power plant that could be built with Indian grant aid.

Meanwhile, underlining the urgency to unite despite differences in ethnicity and caste, Prachanda said till the time the Tharus and Madhesis in Nepal are not taken into confidence, the atmosphere for implementing the new Constitution cannot be created.