Despite reservations from the party’s dissident camp led by Shekhar Koirala and general secretary Gagan Thapa, the Nepali Congress has yet again postponed its Mahasamiti meeting, which had been scheduled after several deferrals in the past.

As per the party statute, the Mahasaminti meeting should convene every year but the Congress, citing various reasons, has been deferring it ever since the 14th general convention was held in December 2021.

Earlier, the meeting of the Mahasamiti, the party’s highest policy-making body, was scheduled for November 7. But the meeting was called off citing the November 3 earthquake, which caused huge damage to life and property in western Nepal districts.

The meeting was then rescheduled for January 1–4 at Godavari in Lalitpur. But leaders are again trying to postpone it citing the upper house elections, among other reasons.

In order to make a decision, the party had called a meeting of the Central Work Execution Committee on Friday. The meeting has decided to convene the Mahasamiti meeting from February 19 to 22, according to Ramesh Lekhak, a central working committee member.

During the meeting, Congress President Sher Bahadur Deuba, who was prepared to defer the Mahasamiti meeting, proposed postponing it once again citing the cold weather in Kathmandu and the upcoming National Assembly elections. The Election Commission has scheduled the election for a third of the upper house seats for January 25.

The main reason for postponing the meeting is elections to the National Assembly, Min Bishwakarma, the head of the Congress publicity division, said. “The meeting also decided to register the party at the Election Commission for the National Assembly elections and entrusted Deuba with distributing tickets to the candidates.”

Deuba was in no mood to hold the meeting on the proposed January 1-4 date. He had clearly indicated that, a central committee member said. “But those who were against deferring the meeting also could not challenge Deuba on Friday.

On Wednesday, a separate gathering of the dissident Koirala-Thapa faction concluded that they will not accept the decision to defer the Mahasamiti meeting yet again. But the warning of senior leader Koirala, general secretaries duo Thapa and Bishwa Prakash Sharma had little effect. Deuba camp prevailed in the Friday meeting.

Senior Congress leader Arjun Narsingh KC said that questions as to why the government and Parliament have failed to work effectively should be discussed at the Mahasamiti.

Why people are frustrated and why anti-incumbency sentiment is growing among the public should be discussed seriously in the meeting, KC said.

“It seems the level of public frustration has reached the boiling point. This should be discussed at the Mahasamiti meeting and addressed properly,” he said. “People are also fed up with the series of corruption cases that have been exposed. The party should launch a special campaign on how to tame corruption and irregularities.”

The government and Parliament have both failed to discharge their duties properly, KC said. As a political party, Nepali Congress also has become inactive and inefficient.”

The party decided to call a meeting of the central working committee for December 28 to discuss the agenda for the Mahasamiti meeting and preparations for the National Assembly election.

Twenty of the Assembly’s total 59 seats will fall vacant from March 3. One of the vacancies is filled with President Ramchandra Paudel appointing one candidate on the Cabinet’s recommendation while the 19 seats are for elected members.

The ruling coalition is all set to contest the 19 seats jointly. While sharing the seats among the ruling partners, the largest party Congress is preparing to claim at least 10 seats, a central working committee member said.

Deuba will hold negotiations with other ruling parties about the seats for the party, the leader said.

In the local, provincial and federal elections last year, the Congress had forged alliances with the CPN (Maoist Centre), the CPN (Unified Socialist), and the Janata Samajbadi Party. The same coalition will most likely remain intact during the Assembly polls next month.

The meeting also decided to issue a circular to all seven provincial committees of the party to recommend the candidates for the elections, the Congress said in a statement.

Each provincial party committee has been asked to recommend three possible candidates.

Party’s chief secretary Krishna Prasad Poudel has been entrusted with the responsibility of registering the party at the Election Commission and making other preparations for the elections, said Bishawkarma.

The meeting also decided to launch a month-long nationwide campaign with the slogan “Congress in communities”. The central working committee will send representatives to all 77 districts to make the campaign successful. In the earthquake-hit districts of Jajarkot and Rukum, some of the work plans and schedules of the party have been affected so the party will come up with a new working calendar, according to the statement. The party also demanded that the government immediately release the announced cash relief to the quake survivors in Jajarkot and Rukum.

The government had earlier decided to dole out Rs50,000 per quake-hit household for rebuilding their homes.