The ruling coalition Nepali Congress on Wednesday failed to pick its ministers owing to mounting dispute within the party. 

The dispute within the NC delayed the Cabinet expansion though the party was supposed to name its leaders to be inducted in the Cabinet today. 

The faction led by party President Sher Bahadur Deuba finalised the names while Ram Chanda Poudel's faction failed to decide on the names during the meeting held at Poudel's residence. 

The central members and lawmakers close to Poudel met at the latter's residence, but failed to arrive at consenus. Insted, they accused President Deuba of violating party's statute and traditional norms and values while selecting leaders for the ministers. So the meeting for now stopped the process to select names for ministers, said central member Gururaj Ghimire. 

The NC had agreed with the CPN (Maoist Centre) that it would have 13 ministers from the party. Out of those, Poudel's faction demanded five ministries which President Deuba denied, it was learnt. 

According to leader Ghimire, leader Poudel's faction has decided not to join the government if they were not awarded dignified share. 

Earlier the prolonged general convention of Nepal Student Union had delayed the NC's decision on selection of leaders for government. Prior to this the NC had sent leaders Bimalendra Nidhi and Ramesh Lekhak, who are now the Deputy Prime Minister and Home Minister, and the Minister for Physical Infrastructure and Transport Management respectively. 

A leader attending the meeting at Poudel's residence, Bal Bahadur KC, said the meeting also decided to urge party President to abide by party statute and tradition. "It is President Deuba's responsibility to take ahead the party in a unified manner," he added. 

As party President Deuba is leaving for Singapore for treatment on Friday, preparations were made to conclude the selection of leaders to expand the government. 

However, the CPN (Maoist-Centre) has already sent the ministers from its sides. RSS