The major political parties- UCPN (Maoist), Nepali Congress, CPN-UML and United Democratic Madhesi Front (UDMF) gave continuity to the top level meetings on Sunday as well. The top leaders held two rounds of talks today but they could not arrive at a common position on the state restructuring, the most contentious issue related to the constitution drafting process. Instead, the core agenda was diverted to the formation of national unity government in today's meeting.

In the meetings, Nepali Congress raised the agenda of the formation of national consensus government saying that it was  one of the components of the seven point agreement.

Emerging from the meeting, the UCPN (Maoist) chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal said that the meeting dwelt on form of the governance, state restructuring and unity government and they were close to the agreement on all three agendas.

“Constituent Assembly meeting has been called after two days. We expect to  reach consensus by then,” he said.

The UCPN (Maoist) has proposed 10- state federal model while NC has suggested seven-state model to federate the country. The NC has refused to federate the country into more than seven states though the Maoist party, UML and UDMF are learnt to have been positive to federate the country into more than 10 states.

According to the UML chairman Jhala Nath Khanal, party leader Madhav Kumar Nepal’s new proposal to federate the country into 12 states in the in yesterday’s meeting was not the official position of his party. Nepalnews.com