SC meet today after regrouping concludes

THT ONLINE

KATHMANDU: A meeting of the Special Committee (for supervision, integration and rehabilitation of Maoist combatants) has been slated for Tuesday afternoon as the teams from the Secretariat of the SC deployed at the cantonments expect to conclude the regrouping process by the end of the day.

This second phase of regrouping process allowed one more chance to those Maoist fighters who had earlier opted for integration.

In the first phase of regrouping process, 9,705 fighters had shown keen interest to join the army. However, in the ongoing regrouping process, more than half have abandoned their desire to join army and went for voluntary retirement.

As of Monday, 5,487 have given up on their earlier stance to join the army.

In the today’s meeting convened by Prime Minister Dr Baburam Bhattarai, SC members are expected to dwell over technical issues attached to the integration process including the composition of the selection committee, duration of training and bridging course and ranks for the to-be-integrated Maoist fighters, and the structure of the directorate general under the Nepal Army.

Today’s SC meet is also awaited to take a final call on structure and leadership of the directorate.

It has been agreed earlier that the directorate general will be formed as per the Army Act-2007 through an executive decision by the government.

What was agreed earlier?

• Composition of selection committee: Two panels to be formed — one for selecting fighters as officer cadets and another for picking recruits

• Training period: Nine months for officer cadets, seven months for recruits

• Bridging course: Three months

• Directorates: Four to be set up — national development, industrial security, forest and ecological security, and disaster management

• Rank determination and norms: Pursuant to November 1 seven-point deal and practice followed in the NA

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