The Nepal government will send its recently issued map — which includes Lipulekh, Kalapani and Limpiyadhura — to United Nations, India and the international community by mid-August.
These areas also feature on India’s map.
“Nepal to send new updated map to India, United Nations, Google and international communities by middle of this month,” Padma Aryal, Minister for Land Management, Cooperatives and Poverty Alleviation told ANI.
The ministry, according to the ANI report, has asked the Department of Measurement to print 4,000 copies of the new map in English and send it to the international community.
The map, released by Nepal on 20 May, was rejected by India. Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson Anurag Srivastava had said that the “revision is a unilateral act and it is not based on historical facts and evidences”. “Such artificial enlargement of territorial claims will not be accepted by us,” he had added.
After Nepal’s lower house of Parliament unanimously passed the amendment in June that gives legal guarantee to the new map, it drew a sharp response from India.
“This artificial enlargement of claims is not based on historical fact or evidence and is not tenable. It is also violative of our current understanding to hold talks on outstanding boundary issues,” he said.
The amendment was later also passed by Nepal’s upper house of Parliament.
Former Indian Ambassador to Nepal Rakesh Sood had told HuffPost India in June that if the country’s Parliament passes the constitutional amendment bill, it will make it more difficult to resolve matters, either now or in the future.
However, Madhu Raman Acharya, former foreign secretary of Nepal had said that though the adoption of the map may seem to be posing a temporary setback, it will eventually help resolve the issue based on facts and treaties. He told HuffPost India that Nepal is still committed to resolving the matter through bilateral dialogue even if the map is adopted.