As Balen Shah begins engaging India, China and others, the larger test will be whether this diplomatic space can be translated into strategic economic opportunities — particularly through deeper India-Nepal value-chain integration and access to global markets

A compliment is certainly due to newly elected Prime Minister Balendra Shah for taking time to find his feet before engaging Nepal's key partners. He has demonstrated resilience and composure amid relentless social-media berating over what many described as his "strategic silence." Perhaps, in the process, PM Shah stole all the gossip!

Setting aside the pun, all eyes are now on Monday, August 10, when Prime Minister Shah is expected to meet the Indian and Chinese envoys, followed by the US Chargé d'affaires on Tuesday, as reported by The Kathmandu Post.

This appears to be a carefully sequenced set of engagements with Nepal's two vital neighbours.

India remains strategically vital to Nepal for trade, commerce, connectivity and extensive people-to-people linkages. Nepal's historic linkages with China likewise extend beyond contemporary geopolitics, including important economic, cultural and people-to-people exchanges with the Tibet Autonomous Region, particularly across Nepal's northern region.

Interestingly, The Kathmandu Post has reported that Prime Minister Shah did not receive requests for meetings with US Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asian Affairs Samir Paul Kapur and President Donald Trump's Special Envoy for South and Central Asia Sergio Gor, and subsequently did not grant an audience to US Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy Sarah B. Rogers. I do not have details of these requests or the circumstances surrounding the reported decisions. It would therefore be inappropriate to draw definitive conclusions about the Prime Minister's intent. But the reported sequence deserves more than passing diplomatic commentary. The issue is not whether Nepal should engage the........

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