Kathmandu, June 20
The ruling Nepal Communist Party has decided to support a proposal about requiring a seven-year threshold for issuing naturalised citizenship to women marrying Nepali citizens in an amendment to the existing citizenship law.
A meeting of the party’s secretariat on Saturday morning decided to endorse the proposal floated by Shashi Shrestha, the chairperson of the State Affairs and Good Governance Committee in the House of Representatives. Owing to disagreements among the parties on the issue, a bill to amend the Citizenship Act is currently pending in the committee for the past two years.
As per the current act, a foreign woman marrying a Nepali citizen can apply for naturalised Nepali citizenship immediately once she denounces another citizenship. The main opposition, Nepali Congress, has been advocating for the retention of the provision. Another opposition party, People’s Socialist Party Nepal, is also unlikely to accept the new proposal.
However, the NCP leaders have decided to ask the committee to forward the bill on the majority basis.
Meanwhile, the NCP secretariat also rejected the demand of women of the lawmakers of the party that foreign men marrying Nepali citizens be given citizenship with the provision of a similar threshold. During the discussion today, Narayan Kaji Shrestha only supported the idea.
