Kathmandu, March 22

Nepali Congress is preparing to hold election of its parliamentary party leader by the second week of April.

The position of the party's PP leader, who is the party's official prime ministerial candidate, has been lying vacant after the PP leader Sushil Koirala died on February 9.

The party, on Friday, had formed a three member committee headed by Ramesh Rijal, which comprised of Surendra Raj Pande and Guru Raj Ghimire, mandating it to make necessary arrangements for the election and fix the election date.

"I have called a meeting of the committee for Friday. We, in consultation with party leaders, are preparing to fix the election date and it is likely be between April 2 to 12," election committee coordinator Rijal said.

The Congress had elected Sher Bahadur as party president in its 13th National General Convention held from March 3 to 7 in Kathmandu.

Deuba is preparing to forge consensus within the party to become consensual candidate for PP leader and contest for the post if consensus eludes him.

The rival faction led by Ramchandra Paudel is also holding consultations about who should become the candidate for the PP leaders from the faction. Late Koirala had defeated Deuba by 16 votes in the PP elections held in January 2014.

The election committee will also prepare a draft for adjusting the P'’s Working Committee to adjust the representation of zones to seven provinces as the new constitution has removed the provision of 14 zones and has provisioned seven provinces under the new federal structure, said election committee member Guru Raj Ghimire.