NEW DELHI – The Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) said that India and Nepal have greatly improved their collaboration on managing their borders. From July 28 to 29, New Delhi hosted the seventh meeting of the India-Nepal Boundary Working Group (BWG). The two-day meeting aimed to clarify and streamline the border between the two countries.
Hitesh Kumar S Makwana, Surveyor General of India, and Prakash Joshi, Director General of Nepal’s Survey Department, were in charge of the meeting. Both parties took a close look at boundaries, showing that there is a renewed drive for bilateral cooperation on border issues after a six-year break since the last BWG meeting in August 2019.
The seventh BWG meeting’s most important result was the adoption of “Updated Modalities for Inspection, Repair & Maintenance of Boundary Pillars along the India-Nepal Boundary.” This new structure is meant to speed up work on the maintenance of the current boundary pillars, which are very important for identifying the 1,751-kilometer-long border. Nepal’s Department of Survey says that 1,325 of the 8,554 boundary pillars that have been put in place are missing, and 1,956 are either partially or entirely damaged. This shows how important it is to keep up with these repairs.
The MEA said on X, “The 7th India-Nepal Boundary Working Group met in New Delhi (July 28-29), co-chaired by the Surveyor General of India and the DG of the Survey Department of Nepal.” Both sides talked about the India-Nepal border issues, agreed on new ways to check, repair, and maintain the border pillar, and made a work plan for the next few years.
In addition to maintaining the pillars, both countries agreed on a detailed work plan for the next three years. They promised to finish construction on the boundary during this time, save for the disputed Kalapani and Susta areas. They also agreed that current technology should be used to improve border management. This would make the work of the BWG and its related systems more efficient, especially when it comes to GPS mapping of boundary pillars and dealing with land shifts caused by changes in river courses.
The Governments of Nepal and India set up the BWG in 2014. Its job is to build, restore, and fix boundary pillars, clear encroachments on no-man’s land, and do other technical activities. The Survey Officials Committee (SOC) and Joint Field Survey Teams (FSTs) help it run.
The meeting ended with everyone signing the minutes that had been agreed upon. Both parties said they were committed to holding the next Survey Officials Committee (SOC) meeting in Nepal on dates that worked for both sides, which was planned to happen in August 2025, to keep making progress on boundary-related issues. At a time that works for everyone, the next BWG meeting will also be in Nepal.
The summit did not talk about the long-standing territorial issues over Kalapani, Limpiyadhura, Lipulekh, and Susta, even though there was a lot of progress made on the technical side of border administration. These disputed areas, where Nepal has made stronger statements and claims on maps in recent years, are usually dealt with by the foreign secretary. However, the revived involvement at the BWG level is a good sign that practical collaboration on other important border issues may improve.