Bound by Roti-Beti: Rajnath Singh says India-Nepal ties beyond ordinary, can't be broken

PTI photo

New Delhi: The government will sort out the misunderstanding, if there is any, between India and Nepal through dialogue, Union Defence Minister Rajnath Singh asserted on Monday (June 15) amid rising border tension between the two neighbouring countries. 

Rajnath, who was addressing a virtual 'BJP Jan Sanwad' rally today, stated that tied between India and Nepal are not ordinary. "We are bound together by 'roti-beti' and no power in world can break it," he said. 

Speaking on the Indo-Nepal border issue, the Defence Minister also said that the road built by BRO in Lipulekh is very much in Indian territory. 

A day ago on June 14, India strongly raised the killing of its national by Nepalese border guards in a border area near Sitamarhi district of Bihar. The matter was raised with the Nepali mission in Delhi and by the Indian mission in Kathmandu with the Nepali Home Ministry. 

On June 12, Nepalese Armed Police Force opened fire on a crowd at the India-Nepal border, thus killing a 22-year-old Indian farmer from Bihar's Sitamarhi and injuring two others following an altercation. They also took one Indian national into its custody before releasing him a day later. 

The incident comes amidst heightened tension between India and Nepal after Nepali PM KP Sharma Oli-led government issued a new map showing parts of Indian territories as its own. The Indian side has rejected the new Nepal map saying it has no historical evidence. India, on the other hand, termed the territorial claims by Nepal as artificial enlargement.

The ties between the two countries came under strain after Defence Minister Rajnath Singh inaugurated an 80-km-long strategically crucial road connecting the Lipulekh pass with Dharchula in Uttarakhand on May 8.