Nepal’s Finance Minister likely to visit New Delhi this week

In what would be the first bilateral visit after the August 26 flash floods, which left over 1,300 dead and 5,000 more unaccounted for in the Himalayan country, Nepal’s Finance Minister Swarnim Wagle is likely to visit India later this week, sources in Delhi said.

Wagle, the most-experienced minister in Nepal’s cabinet headed by Prime Minister Balendra Shah, is likely to arrive in Delhi on September 17-18. Here, he will meet his counterpart Nirmala Sitharaman, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar, and other key officials in the Indian government.

According to sources, Wagle is expected to discuss economic cooperation, post-disaster reconstruction, and economic recovery during his two-day visit. He is also slated to address a business body and give a talk at Delhi University.

After flash floods wreaked havoc in Nepal, India was quick to provide humanitarian aid and emergency power support. It delivered about 95 tonnes of aid material and disaster relief supplies. Additionally, New Delhi also deployed tunnel rescue specialists, forensic experts, and a five-member medical team to aid the rescue and recovery efforts there.

Sources hinted that the Nepalese Finance Minister’s visit to India is likely to discuss additional financial support for his country. New Delhi has provided similar support after an earthquake rocked the Himalayan country in 2015.

Many also see Wagle’s visit as Kathmandu’s efforts to make up for its earlier snub of India, when Nepal PM Balendra ‘Balen’ Shah refused to give audience to the Indian Ambassador and his subsequent hesitation to meet Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri in May, which resulted in the latter’s event being cancelled.

The course correction, they say, began well before the flash floods, when, in June, Nepal’s top leader Rabi Lamichhane of the ruling Rastriya Swatantra Party (RSP) party, visited New Delhi. Here, he was received by India’s leadership, including PM Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah.

Wagle’s visit will likely build on that momentum and the recent signs of cooperation in the wake of the floods. In early September, Nepal PM Balen Shah had thanked India for its timely assistance in the wake of the flash floods.

Shubhajit Roy, Diplomatic Editor at The Indian Express, has been a journalist for more than 27 years now. Roy joined The Indian Express in October 2003 and has been reporting and writing explainers and analysis on foreign affairs for about 19 years now.

Based in Delhi, he has also led the National government and political bureau at The Indian Express in Delhi — a team of reporters who cover the national government and politics for the newspaper. He has got the Ramnath Goenka Journalism award for Excellence in Journalism ‘2016.

He got this award for his coverage of the Holey Bakery attack in Dhaka and its aftermath. He won the Ramnath Goenka Journalism award, 2023, for the second time for his reporting of the Oct 7 attacks on Israel and the war in Gaza.

He also got the IIMCAA Award for the Journalist of the Year, 2022, (Jury’s special mention) for his coverage of the fall of Kabul in August 2021 — he was one of the few Indian journalists in Kabul and the only mainstream newspaper to have covered the Taliban’s capture of power in mid-August, 2021.

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