NEW DELHI: In less than a fortnight of forming the new coalition government in Nepal, slight chinks in behaviour have begun to be noticed between the newly appointed Prime Minister, Pushpa Kamal Dahal popularly known as Prachanda, and his coalition partner KP Sharma also referred to as 'Oli'.
While Prachanda won the vote of confidence in Nepal’s Parliament on January 10th, which his former ally and now opposition member Sher Bahadur Deuba also supported, there are a few instances which have raised eyebrows.
"Prachanda went to Deuba’s house a day ahead of the vote of confidence and Deuba supported him too, which clearly indicates that Deuba will be ready to support him if he ever decides. The undercurrents in Parliament today between Deuba and Prachanda seemed very favourable of each other," said former Nepalese Ambassador, Vijay Kant Karna.
Oli reportedly issued a barb at Deuba saying "that you wont be able to catch the fish this time." Meanwhile, on January 9th, during a discussion on the Common Minimum Program in Parliament, Oli reiterated that he was the policy maker and government will implement whatever he suggested. PM Prachanda politey countered this and said that PM post is arranged by the constitution and he was not just an ornamental leader.
"During the same discussion, on January 9th, Oli also began to justify his decision in 2021 of dissolving the Parliament. On this Prachanda said that there was no need to mention about dissolution of Parliament or to bring it up at present," Karna added.
While the new government is less than a month old, these jibes and undercurrents of an alternate coalition partner are likely to continue, as in Nepal flip flops are not uncommon.