'We will respectfully bid farewell to monarchy'

Kathmandu, Apr 17: Senior Maoist leader Baburam Bhattarai has said the first meeting of the Constituent Assembly (CA) will respectfully bid farewell to the monarchy.

''We want to respectfully remove monarchy,'' Dr Bhattarai told mediapersons. Maoist Chairman Prachanda urged King Gyanendra to vacate the Narayanhity palace on his own. ''The people have already given their mandate. He should vacate the palace,'' Nepalnews quoted him as saying. ''That will make the job easier for us. And that will be in the interest of the country, him and all of us,'' he said. The Maoist party was leading the CA polls with 119 seats out of the 221 seats of which result was declared.

Nepali Congress (NC) was in the second place with 34 seats, CPN-UML had 31 and MJF had 23 seats.

Meanwhile, the NC has called a meeting of the central committee to discuss the defeat in the elections.

Former prime minister Sher Bahadur Deuba said the defeat was due to the fear and intimidation of the Maoists in the districts.

Voters were not able to cast their votes freely as there was threat and terror of the Maoists, he added.

UNI