Indo-Asian News Service

Kathmandu, Sept 7

Reeling under the double whammy of bribery allegations and a lawmaker receiving life term for murder, Nepal’s Maoist party lost today’s Prime Ministerial Election, for the seventh time in a row, plunging the country into a deeper political crisis. Maoist Chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal Prachanda, who had led a successful 10-year war against the monarchist government and won the Prime Ministership with a thumping majority just two years ago, could muster only 252 votes for the same post today. He fell far short of the halfway mark of 300 in the currently 599-member Parliament, despite speculation that he would this time be able to break into the Terai vote bank. While 110 MPs voted against him, 159 MPs continued to abstain, leading to his staggering seventh defeat. Since the fall of his eight-month government last year and the growing controversies about his party, the former revolutionary has failed to recapture his victory over his challenger, former deputy prime minister Ram Chandra Poudel of the Nepali Congress — a failure that the Maoists blame on “Indian intervention”. The election, started last month after Prime Minister Madhav Kumar Nepal resigned June 30, has remained inconclusive all through two months with two of the largest groups in the house deciding to stay neutral in protest. But while the Prime Minister’s Communist party of Nepal-Marxist Leninist with its 109 MPs said that it would still stay neutral, there was doubt about the front of four regional parties from the Terai plains, whose 82 lawmakers could have helped Prachanda return to power. Though the Terai front too has been sitting neutral, last time one of their partners decided to break away, declaring to vote and end the protracted political crisis. Led by former Foreign Minister Upendra Yadav, the Madhesi Janadhikar Forum Nepal with its 25 MPs, was regarded as ready to back the Maoists. The council of ministers on Monday also decided to form an inquiry committee after consultations with the chairman of parliament, Subas Nembang.