Kathmandu, April 16: India has protested over anti-India rhetoric by the Maoists even after joining the government in Nepal, with New Delhi cautioning Kathmandu that such behaviour would not improve relations.
 Incidents like showing black flags to Indian envoy, shouting anti-India slogans and even defacing Indian flags at public places by the Maoist cadres, which have been intensified these days, cannot possibly improve relations with India, Indian envoy Rakesh Sood is learnt to have to told Maoist chief Prachanda and Prime Minister Jhala Nath Khanal.
 The Nepalese government survives on the support of largest coalition partner, the Maoists.
 The comments by the ambassador comes as External Affairs Minister S M Krishna is proposing to visit Nepal, which has not yet been officially fixed as Kathmandu is yet to appoint its Foreign Minister.
 Sood was shown black flags when he paid visits to western Nepal districts towards the end of March to handover India aided projects to the local communities.
 These projects which include drinking water, education, health services, and construction of roads are being implemented under Indian assistance in accordance with the rules and regulations of Nepal government and in association with the local government agencies.
 The Maoist cadres also defaced Indian national flags along East-West highway where India has built 22 bridges at the cost of NRs.92 crore and spent another 80 crore Nepalese rupees to build 75 per cent of the road projects.
 India annually disburses around Rs 200 crore to implement various development projects in Nepal under its economic assistance programme.
 Over the past three years around one hundred such projects have already been completed and currently some 200 projects are under construction in various parts of the country.
 The Maoists have been consistently showing protests while officials from Indian Embassy visit the project sites in connection with handing over the assistance or on inspection tours.
 It is interesting to note that in some villages, the local Maoist leaders also attend the function to hand over Indian aided projects while at other places, they create obstacles to the functions organized for launching of the projects.
 Despite the Maoists' creating obstacles such projects receive overwhelming public support which is evident from large crowd present during such functions.

Lastupdate on : Sat, 16 Apr 2011 21:30:00 Makkah time
Lastupdate on : Sat, 16 Apr 2011 18:30:00 GMT
Lastupdate on : Sun, 17 Apr 2011 00:00:00 IST