Lawmakers of UCPN (Maoist) from the indigenous and ethnic communities have pointed out the need of amending and revising the preliminary draft of a new constitution citing that it has failed to address the rights of these communities. As many as 27 lawmakers from the party have submitted the memorandum for the purpose to the constitution political dialogue and consensus committee (CPDCC) chair Dr Baburam Bhattarai. The memo states that the draft has narrowed down the rights of these communities more than the Interim Constitution. They have further urged to mention the word ‘people’s war’ and ‘secularism’ in the preamble of the new constitution. Similarly, the memo calls for including the provision of the national animal, mother tongue, right to equality, higher education in mother tongue, right to culture, structure of the state, state power sharing, federal parliament among other issues. Likewise, six lawmakers from the Madhesi community have also submitted a memo to CPDCC chair Bhattarai calling for mentioning the words ‘Madhes revolution’ and ‘federal’ in the new constitution.RSS
