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Nepali Ambassador to India Shankar Prasad Sharma held a meeting with External Affairs Minister of India S Jaishankar on Thursday. During the meeting, the duo discussed Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal’s upcoming visit to India, it has been learnt. Though the formal announcement of the visit is yet to be made, a source said that Prime Minister Dhal will leave for India on a three-day visit on May 31. A source at the Nepali Embassy in New Delhi said that Ambassador Sharma and Minister Jaishankar held a discussion to make Prime Minister Dahal’s India visit fruitful. Ambassador Sharma informed through Twitter that he held a meeting with External Affairs Minister of India Jaishankar. He said that they discussed making the ties between Nepal and India even stronger on the occasion.    

The District Attorney’s Office on Wednesday filed four different cases at the Kathmandu District Court against 30 individuals involved in the fake Bhutanese refugee scam. The Attorney’s Office said that four different types of cases--fraud, organized crime, forgery and treason--were filed against them, demanding a jail term of 24 years. The Office has sought a fine of Rs 288.4 million from them. Police had submitted their investigation report on the fake Bhutanese refugee case to the District Attorney’s Office on Monday. Police had started the investigation from March 26. So far, police have arrested 16 individuals including former deputy prime minister Top Bahadur Rayamajhi and former home minister Bal Krishna Khand while 17 others including Pratik Thapa, son of former home minister Ram Bahadur Thapa and Niraj Rai, son of Indrajit Rai, who served as security advisor to Thapa, are on the run.    

Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal has said the budget for the upcoming fiscal year would be allocated by keeping Karnali, Sudurpaschim and Madhes, the provinces which are backward in the Human Development Index (HDI), at the center. PM Dahal said this during a meeting with a delegation including Chief Minister of Sudurpaschim Province Kamal Bahadur Shah at the Prime Minister's residence in Baluwatar today. The Prime Minister asserted that the development of all these three provinces would be kept in priority in the budget for the upcoming fiscal year. On the occasion, the delegation briefed the Prime Minister about the overall economic situation of the province and the ongoing development and construction activities there, urging him to give special priority to the province in the appropriation of the budget. Prime Minister Dahal said some special provisions centering on Sudurpaschim Province have been made in the government's policies and programs and it would be kept in priority in the budget as well, according to Govinda Acharya, the PM's press advisor. The delegation also called attention of the Prime Minister on the reduction of the equalization grants to the province in the current fiscal year. The delegation also separately met with National Planning Commission (NPC) Vice-Chairman Min Bahadur Shrestha and Finance Minister Dr Prakash Saran Mahat on Tuesday.

Rastriya Swatantra Party (RRP) Chairman Rabi Lamichhane said that a parliamentary special committee should be formed to investigate the fake Bhutanese refugee scam. During a Parliament meeting held on Wednesday, Lamichhane expressed his doubt that the ongoing investigation into Bhutanese refugee case would satisfy the public. "The Parliament should form a special probe committee to deal with the issue," he said, adding, “Corruption has been the concern of the party since its establishment.” "We doubt the intentions of frequent sittings among three political parties since the scam came to light. Now, many political parties have been alleged of having a role in the scam,” he said. “The role of state bodies including those responsible for preventing corruption is questionable. Under all these circumstances, we are not convinced that the ongoing investigation into the scam would be concluded impartially. So, it is a must to handle the case by a specific parliamentary committee," Lamichhane added.