The CPN-UML has concluded that it is time for the political parties to initiate the Constituent Assembly (CA) procedure as the chances are slim to forge consensus on all issues of new constitution before January 22.

A meeting of the UML Standing Committee on Sunday reviewed the talks among the political parties and decided to initiate discussions to forge consensus on the procedure from now onwards. “We will try to forge consensus until the last moment. But we should not delay in going to process if consensus could not be forged,” said UML Vice-Chairman Yuvraj Gyawali. “We still need support from other political parties to go for the voting process. For that we will hold serious discussions with other parties and CA chairman.”

The ruling Nepali Congress and CPN-UML , among other parties, are in favor of taking the contentious issues of constitution drafting for voting if consensus cannot be forged. However, the alliance of opposition parties led by UCPN (Maoist) has been opposing the voting process. The opposition parties have been demanding consensus on all the issues of constitution drafting reports e-Kantipur.