Kathmandu:
Ranjit Rae will be India's new ambassador to Nepal, succeeding Jayant Prasad. The change takes place at a time when Nepal is preparing for second elections of the Constituent Assembly in November.
Mr Rae was previously ambassador to Vietnam. He is from the 1980 batch of the Indian Foreign Service and has served as joint secretary (North), a division that oversees relations with Nepal, during 2002-06 at the Ministry of External Affairs, at a time when Nepal was at peak of Maoist movement.
56-year-old Rae is seen as one of the architects of the 12-point agreement signed in 2005 in New Delhi between then seven-party Alliance of Nepal and the CPN (Maoist).
The pact initiated the peace process in Nepal, got the Maoist rebels to join the peace process and made the first Constituent Assembly elections a reality.