Two events that Nepal has given high-importance to on the sidelines of the 79th United Nations General Assembly in New York this year—a meeting between Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli and his Indian counterpart Narendra Modi and convening the SAARC Council of Ministers—have slim chances to materialise.

A request has already been made to the Indian side for a meeting between Prime Minister Oli and his Indian counterpart Modi on the margins of the Summit of the Future to be organised by UN Secretary General António Guterres, a foreign ministry official said.

“The meeting between Oli and Modi has yet to be confirmed despite a positive note from the Indian Embassy in Kathmandu for the same.”

Officials at Nepal's permanent mission in New York are, nonetheless, busy making arrangements in anticipation of the Oli-Modi meeting. Foreign Minister Arzu Rana, in conversation with the Post, also expressed optimism for the meet.

Prime Minister Oli will head for New York leading the Nepali delegation on September 20.

Modi will not attend the UN general assembly this year. The External Affairs Minister of India, S Jaishnakar, will represent India at the UN summit and will address the assembly.

According to Indian media reports, Modi will attend the summit of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (Quad) at US President Joe Biden's hometown of Delaware on September 21.

After attending the Quad summit, Modi will reach New York on September 22 and will address the Indian community living there. Besides Oli, other heads of governments and states attending the general assembly as well as the Summit of the Future, including Chief Adviser Muhammad Yunus of the new Bangladeshi government, are looking to meet Modi.

On September 23, the Indian prime minister will attend the Summit of the Future and return to New Delhi. There is a small window of November 22 night and before Modi’s departure for India, said a joint-secretary at the foreign ministry. Nepali officials are looking at this opportunity.

Nepal’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations Lok Bahadur Thapa held talks with Parvathaneni Harish, India’s permanent representative to the United Nations, on Monday in New York and explored the possibility of the meeting between the two leaders.

“There is no reason why there should not be a meeting between the two prime ministers,” said a Nepali diplomat based in New York. The Nepali mission is also arranging for meetings of Oli and Foreign Minister Arzu Rana with several of their counterparts.

“Underlining the deep and ancient linkages between the two countries and peoples, they agreed to further India-Nepal partnership in the UN,” the permanent mission of India to the United Nations wrote on the social site X after the meeting between Thapa and Harish.

Earlier, Oli and Modi were preparing to meet on the sidelines of the sixth summit of the Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation (BIMSTEC) in Thailand. The summit was postponed due to an unforeseen political situation in the country.

Nepal is also looking to host the meeting of the Saarc Council of Ministers on the margins of the UN general assembly in New York on September 26.

“We have received concurrence from almost all member states besides Afghanistan, which is not recognised by the South Asian community yet. The meeting will not take place this year too as India is reluctant to participate,” the joint-secretary at the foreign ministry said.

Nepal is the current chair of SAARC. This November it will complete ten years to become the longest serving chair of the regional grouping.

If this time too the meeting does not take place, it will be the fifth consecutive year that the SAARC Council of Ministers, usually scheduled during the annual UN general assembly, fails to convene. The South Asian grouping has been paralysed due to the longstanding rivalry between India and Pakistan. The 19th summit was scheduled to take place in Pakistan but was cancelled due to cross-border terrorism and an attack on the Indian Army base.

In the last eight years, the Nepali side has allegedly made no serious effort to hand over the grouping’s chair. Due to the enmity between India and Pakistan, the entire SAARC process has stalled since 2016.

The New York meeting, considered a “tone-setter” to high-level meetings, including the summit, did not occur in 2020, 2021, 2022 and 2023.

In 2019, the foreign ministers of India and Pakistan boycotted each other’s addresses at a meeting of the SAARC Council of Ministers organised on the margins of the 74th UN General Assembly.

In 2020, the meeting was held virtually, and the member states pledged to enhance regional integration, but it failed to end the logjam in the SAARC process. In 2021, the meeting was called off at the last minute, after member states did not agree to attend. As per the Saarc tradition, no meeting or summit can proceed even if one member state objects to it.

On September 5, the government approved the upcoming visit of Prime Minister Oli to New York, the first foreign trip after he took office on July 15. The prime minister will address the UN General Assembly on September 26. Oli will lead an official delegation of 19 people, including his spouse Radhika Shakya, Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Bishnu Paudel, Foreign Minister Rana, adviser to Prime Minister Bishnu Rimal, senior government officials, media persons, security personnel, and personal physicians.

Foreign Minister Rana, who is all set to visit Canada ahead of the UN assembly, will join the delegation in New York.

Besides other engagements, the prime minister will attend an interaction at Columbia University on September 25 on the topic of “Nepal's journey to democracy and economic prosperity”.