Remove me if you can: PM Oli dares Prachanda

Nepal's embattled Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli on Sunday challenged the ruling Nepal Communist Party's splinter faction led by Pushpa Kamal Dahal 'Prachanda' to remove him from the top post if he can.

Addressing an event in his home district, Jhapa, Prime Minister Oli challenged the Prachanda-led faction to table a vote of no confidence motion and endorse that, My Republica newspaper reported. "K P Oli is still the parliamentar y party leader of the NCP. He is the party chairman as well as the prime minister," 69-year-old Oli s ai d. "If you have restored parliament, remove KP Oli from the prime ministerial post."

Nepal plunged into a political crisis on December 20 af ter President Bidya Devi Bhandari dissolved the House and announced fresh elections on April 30 and May 10 at the recommendation of Prime Minister Oli, amidst a tussle for power within the ruling Nepal Communist Party (NCP). In a landmark ruling, a fivemember constitutional bench led by Chief Justice Cholendra Shumsher last week annulled the Oli government's "unconstitutional" decision to dissolve the 275-member lower house of Parliament. The court ordered the government to summon the House session within the next 13 days. The ruling party suffered a vertical split following Oli's decision to dissolve the lower house.