Nepal's PM Sher Bahadur Deuba wishes PM Modi on his 72nd birthday

Nepal's Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba on Saturday extended greetings to Prime Minister Narendra Modi on his 72nd birthday.

"On the occasion of your birthday, best wishes for good health and long life, Prime Minister @narendramodi. May Shri Pashupatinath always protect you," tweeted Deuba.

Recently in May, PM Modi made an official visit to Nepal where the two leaders held bilateral talks in Lumbini.

Both the leaders participated in the foundation stone laying ceremony for the construction of a Centre of Buddhist Culture and Heritage in Lumbini.

Prior to this, PM Modi visited the Maya Devi Temple. He was accompanied by PM Deuba and his spouse Arzu Rana Deuba.

The PMs paid their respects at the Marker Stone inside the temple premises, which pinpoints the exact birth spot of Lord Buddha. They attended the pooja conducted as per Buddhist rituals.

The two Prime Ministers also lit lamps near the Ashoka Pillar located adjacent to the temple.

Thereafter, the two Prime Ministers watered the Bodhi tree sapling from Bodh Gaya which was gifted by PM Modi to Lumbini in 2014 and also signed the temple's visitor's book.

As Prime Minister, this was his fifth visit to Nepal and first to Lumbini.

Prior to this, in April PM Modi and his Nepalese counterpart Sher Bahadur Deuba met in New Delhi to launch multiple initiatives as well as signing four crucial agreements in multiple domains.

The two countries signed agreements on Nepal becoming the 105th member of the International Solar Alliance (ISA), technical cooperation in railways, supply of petroleum products and sharing of technical expertise in the petroleum sector between Indian Oil Corporation Ltd. (IOCL) and Nepal Oil Corporation Ltd. (NOC).

The two Prime Ministers also witnessed the launch of the first passenger train service between India's Jayanagar and Nepal's Kurtha, the hand-over of the Solu corridor transmission project by India to Nepal and the progress of the construction of 132 health facilities across 10 districts in Nepal under a Government of India (GoI) grant.

The two countries announced the launch of the Indian RuPay card in Nepal, with the domestic variant of the RuPay card (roughly 83 per cent of all RuPay cards issued) to be functional on about 1400 Point of Sale (POS) machines in Nepal.

The move makes Nepal the fourth country outside India where RuPay is functional after Bhutan, Singapore and UAE.

The inaugurated Jaynagar-Kurtha railway section is part of the Jaynagar-Bijalpura-Bardibas rail link being constructed with grant assistance of INR 548 crore from the Government of India. It is a 35 km rail section, 3 km of which lies in the Indian state of Bihar and the rest in Nepal.

The project is the first broad-gauge passenger rail link between the two countries, opening an entirely new dimension for cross-border connectivity. Till 2014, this was an existing rail service on a metre-gauge rail link between Jaynagar and Janakpur.The Solu Corridor 132 kV power transmission line and substation project is one of the major projects in Nepal undertaken under the Government of India's Line of Credit (LoC). The 90 km 132 kV Double Circuit line connects the remote Solukhumbu, Khotang and Okhaldhunga districts of North Eastern Nepal with Nepal's national electricity grid.

After its operationalization, the transmission line will bring electricity from existing and upcoming hydro projects in the area into the national grid, and also supply power into the rural electrification networks of nearby districts. The project is expected to be crucial for the socio-economic development in the rural part of Nepal, in addition to contributing to Nepal's overall economic and industrial development.

Nepalese Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba also held wide-ranging deliberations with PM Modi on various topics including cooperation in the power sector, railway projects, flood control programs, as well as the border dispute between the two countries.