External Affairs Minister of India Dr S Jaishankar is arriving on a two-day official visit to Nepal on Thursday.
According to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, External Affairs Minister Jaishankar is arriving in Kathmandu to participate in the seventh meeting of the Nepal-India Joint Commission (JC).
He will land at the Tribhuvan International Airport at 10 am by a special airplane of Indian Air Force, a source at the Indian Embassy in Nepal said. He will stay in Nepal for two days.
According to sources at the Foreign Ministry, the two leaders will hold discussions in the JC meeting on the implementation of the agreements reached during Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal’s visit to India.
"The agenda of the visit is almost ready, it has to be finalized after sitting with the Prime Minister," a foreign ministry source said. But our focus will be on the power trade agreement.”
During Prime Minister Prachanda's visit to India from May 31 to June 3, Indian counterpart Narendra Modi said that India would purchase 10,000 megawatts of electricity from Nepal in 10 years.
In the presence of both the Prime Ministers, an 'MoU' was signed for the construction of Phukot Karnali and Lower Arun hydroelectric projects, and the Gorakhpur-Bhairahawa 400 KV transmission lines had been inaugurated.
During his two-day Nepal visit, Minister Jaishankar will pay courtesy calls on President Ram Chandra Paudel, Prime Minister Dahal, Nepali Congress (NC) President Sher Bahadur Deuba and CPN (UML) Chairman KP Sharma Oli, sources have said.
The Council of Ministers of India on September 4 had approved a proposal to procure 10,000 megawatts of electricity from Nepal over the next 10 years.
The sixth JC meeting was held on January 14 and 15 in 2021 in New Delhi. It is going to be held in Nepal, this time, at the request of Nepal. The JC is led by the foreign ministers of the two countries.
