Kathmandu, June 17
The State Affairs and Good Governance Committee in the House of Representatives, once again, has failed to forge consensus among parties in the House regarding a bill to amend the Citizenship Act.
For over one year, the parties are divided on setting conditions for issuing naturalised citizenship
With the hope of forging consensus on the bill, the committee’s chair Shashi Shrestha had floated a new proposal of requiring a woman marrying a Nepali citizen to wait for seven years after marriage to acquire citizenship. However, she could not convince the main opposition party Nepali Congress.
A meeting of the opposition party’s key officials held in Kathmandu this morning decided to advocate for retaining the current provision of giving such women citizenship immediately after they give up the previous one, without waiting for any certain period.
Following the decision, the House committee has directed the government to forge consensus among the parties in the next five days.
