PM Modi Congratulates Nepal’s New Prime Minister Balendra Shah
Prime Minister Narendra Modi has congratulated Balendra Shah on being sworn in as the Prime Minister of Nepal.
In a social media post, the Prime Minister said that the appointment reflects the trust reposed in Shah’s leadership by the people of Nepal.
Modi added that he looks forward to working closely with the Nepal PM to take India-Nepal friendship and cooperation to even greater heights for the mutual benefit of the citizens of both nations.
Rapper-turned-politician Shah was sworn in as Nepal PM on Friday, tasked with restoring political stability and creating jobs in the poor Himalayan nation long troubled by fragile governments and weak growth prospects.
Shah became prime minister after his three-year-old Rastriya Swatantra Party (RSP) won 182 seats in the 275-member parliament in the March 5 election, the first vote after the anti-corruption Gen Z protests in which 76 people were killed in September last year.
A former mayor of the capital, Kathmandu, Shah, 35, is Nepal’s youngest prime minister in decades and the first Madhesi – people of the southern plains bordering India – to lead the Himalayan nation that is wedged between Asian giants India and China.
Shah, who was wearing skin-tight trousers, a matching jacket, his signature black Nepali cloth cap and sunglasses, was sworn in at the President House in the presence of diplomats and senior government officials.