KATHMANDU: The process of writing a new constitution is at a standstill. The inability of major political parties to forge a consensus on contentious issues and lack of active effort from Constituent Assembly (CA) authorities are mainly responsible for this. Although, the given period is measurably shrinking leaving only 94 days for the May-28 deadline, both the sides have not taken concrete efforts in this regard.

There are only two options — the major parties forging a consensus on debatable issues and the CA putting them for vote without waiting prior consensus on them — to meet the deadline.

“Even if the parties and the CA authorities do take one option in a couple of days, it is impossible to draft the statute within the next 94 days,” say sources at the CA. The CA’s Constitutional Committee (CC), which is mandated to compile reports of all subjective committees and give a single shape to the new statute, has no business now. Its meeting today was postponed for an indefinite period as it had nothing to do. The CA’s full house is yet to forward the preliminary reports of its 10 committees out of the 11 to the CC. As per the CA’s latest timeline, it has only 10 days to submit reports of its subjective panels to the CC. However, chances are slim that the CC will receive the reports within the deadline. Because there are issues on which major parties have differences while the CA should approve each report by at least a simple majority before forwarding them to the CC. Although the CA has completed discussions on the reports of all thematic committees, it has forwarded only one report to the CC.

“Chances that the CA will be able to forward all the reports by the next 10 days are fat,” said Sapana Pradhan Malla, a member of the CC. A situation of helplessness and hopelessness at the CA must end, she added.

A CA authority said that even if the CA moved ahead its process without waiting for the parties’ prior consensus on issues, the issues will be trapped at the voting process. “So, the ultimate option is consensus,” the authority said.