By IANS
Kathmandu : The Nepali authorities have given encroaching Indian squatters in the southern Terai plains a month's time to quit or face forcible ouster, Nepal's state media said Sunday.
A group of Indians have built houses and cowsheds in two villages in Sunsari district in southern Nepal, the state-owned Gorkhapatra daily reported earlier this month.
At least seven houses have been built in Amaduba and Sripur villages with the encroachers also beginning to grow jute and banana in the surrounding areas, the report said.
They were also said to be removing the pillars erected to demarcate the border between Nepal and India.
Following the report, an official team went to the area and found that Nepali territory was being encroached upon.
"We have given them one month to leave," Nagendra Bahadur Thapa, Armed Police Force chief in the bordering area, told the state-run Rising Nepal daily.
"The Indians have agreed to leave."
The chief administrative officer of the district, Prem Narayan Sharma, told the state media that his office will also coordinate with the Indian border area authorities.
"If the Indians do not leave, they will be evicted," he said.
The 1,800-km open border that Nepal shares with its southern neighbour India has often been a contentious issue.
With the rivers, which often demarcate the boundary between the two countries, changing their courses, a joint team is currently revising the border.