Indian Foreign Secretary Vinay Mohan Kwatra on Thursday said the Prime Ministers of Nepal and India didn’t discuss the report prepared by the Eminent Persons Group (EPG) and Agnipath scheme.

To the best of my understanding, these issues were not raised during the restrictive-level and delegation-level talks, said Kwatra responding to journalists on questions asked if the two prime ministers discussed the issues.

Earlier today, Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal, who is on a four-day India visit, held a one-on-one meeting with his Indian counterpart Narendra Modi at Hyderabad House in New Delhi. Nepal and India also signed seven different agreements following the delegation-level talks.

Nepal and India had formed an eight-member panel of eminent persons in 2016 to review bilateral relations in their entirety and suggest the way forward. Nepal-India Treaty of Peace and Friendship-1950, which Nepalis in general view as unequal, was also taken up in the panel’s deliberations. The bilateral group prepared a joint report in July 2018 but has failed to submit it to the authorities after the Indian side’s reluctance to receive it.

Nepal has put on hold the recruitment of Nepali youths under the Indian government’s Agnipath scheme.

In another question from a journalist, Indian Foreign Secretary Kwatra made it clear that the issue of the Friendship Treaty was also not discussed during the meetings.

“That issue wasn't raised in the discussion between the two prime ministers,” said Kwatra.