At a time when the ruling CPN-UML remains sharply divided over whether former President Bidya Devi Bhandari should return to active politics, Nepali Congress President Sher Bahadur Deuba has added fuel to the debate with his fresh remark.

Deuba, while responding to journalists’ queries in Morang on Saturday, said that the constitution does not bar former heads of state from rejoining party politics.

Deuba’s statement, however, contradicts his own party’s earlier stance. Deuba, in a meeting with Congress leaders last month, had said that it would not be prudent for a former head of state to rejoin a political party.

Speaking to journalists at Biratnagar Airport on Saturday morning, the former prime minister said, “I don’t know much about this. The constitution neither explicitly allows it, nor does it explicitly prohibit it.”

Deuba’s remarks come at a time when the issue of whether to allow former President Bhandari to return to the UML has caused division in the country’s largest communist party.

In June, Bhandari, who was vice-chair of the party before election to the President in 2015, announced that she had reacquired her party membership with a plan to be active in her old party. She had relinquished the UML membership after being elected the head of state 10 years ago.

But, the party’s secretariat, politburo and central committee meetings in July decided not to renew her membership saying that a person having already served as the country’s President should not rejoin active politics after exiting from the country’s highest office.

Bhandari, however, seems undeterred and the issue still remains a factor for division in the UML rank and file.

She wrote a letter, which was distributed to party delegates at the convention venue on Friday. In the letter, Bhandari urges the party representatives who have gathered from across the country to create an environment favourable to exercise intra-party democracy.

On the other hand, party chairman KP Sharma Oli, at the Second Statute Convention of the UML, looks determined to bar Bhandari from the party, according to leaders.

Despite the Bhandari faction’s attempt to register their dissenting opinion at the statute convention, the party establishment did not permit them even to present it.

UML Standing Committee member Karna Bahadur Thapa submitted the 27-page document to the party headquarters on Thursday, accusing the party of drifting away from democratic practices. Thapa was considering presenting this dissenting opinion at the convention, but was denied the chance.

Senior vice-chair Ishwar Pokhrel, vice-chairs Surendra Pandey and Yubaraj Gyawali, among other leaders, are critical of the party’s decision to keep Bhandari away from the party.

In the backdrop, Deuba’s remarks are likely to further stir up the debate.

Mahesh Bartaula, the UML chief whip, however, argued that what leaders from other parties say about Bhandari’s return to party politics does not matter to the UML. What matters is the party’s official decision, he said.

“Our party has an official stand that former President Bhandari, given the legacy she carries as the head of state, should not return to politics, and we abide by the party’s decision rather than the opinions expressed by others,” Bartaula said.

Deuba’s Saturday statement is notable for its deviation from his earlier stance.

During a meeting with five senior Congress leaders on August 22, Deuba is learnt to have said it would not be prudent for a former President to return to active politics.

Former Congress vice-presidents Gopal Man Shrestha and Bijay Kumar Gachhadar, former general secretaries Prakash Man Singh and Krishna Prasad Sitaula, and former joint general secretary Prakash Sharan Mahat had met Deuba at his residence in Budhanilkantha. During the discussion, they had said it would be inappropriate for a person who once held the prestigious office of the President to return to party politics.

In response, President Deuba had reportedly said he had already conveyed the matter to Prime Minister and UML chair Oli. He also shared his view that a former head of state should not return to active politics, said former Congress vice-president Shrestha.

“As far as we know, our president, Deuba, is against the former President rejoining her party. He did not support it during our earlier conversation, too,” Shrestha, the former Congress vice-chair, said.

He also remarked that the CPN (Maoist Centre) had made a mistake by appointing former vice-president Nanda Bahadur Pun as a vice-chair of the party.

Shrestha said the UML’s decision to make a person under 70 years old the head of state was a mistake. Had someone aged 70 been the President, they would not have considered rejoining politics after completing their tenure. The incumbent President, Ramchandra Paudel, will not aim to return to party politics after completing his tenure, Shrestha added.

Bhandari, now 64, was in her late fifties while being elected President in 2015. It is natural for someone who can still be active in politics to have an aspiration to rejoin politics, the Congress leader argued. The largest party would be against such a move, he added.

Maoist Centre chair Pushpa Kamal Dahal, however, boasts of encouraging Bhandari to rejoin the party and trying to create an environment for that.

“After I first brought former Vice-President [Pun] back to party politics, it has directly or indirectly opened the door for former President Bhandari as well,” Dahal told journalists at Biratnagar Airport on August 28.

The Rastriya Swatantra Party, fourth largest force in the House of Representatives, has officially decided that former presidents and vice-presidents cannot even obtain the party’s central committee membership.

Rastriya Prajantra Party General Secretary Dhawal Shemsher Rana opposes the idea of a former head of state rejoining a political party.

“Although our party has not taken any official position on this matter, a former head of state should not return to active politics,” Rana said.