Nepal snubs India FROM SUDESHNA SARKAR DH NEWS SERVICE KATHMANDU: http://www.deccanherald.com/deccanherald/mar242005/n39.asp After its overtures were spurned by India, a simmering Nepal has struck back, putting New Delhi?s envoy way down its list of priorities, giving precedence to Pakistani diplomats, the kingdom?s own festivals and even Vishwa Hindu Parishad leader Ashok Singhal. As a sign of the entente far from cordiale, India?s ambassador to Nepal Shiv Shankar Mukherjee has been kept waiting for over a month for an audience with King Gyanendra while the monarch has readily granted audience to Pakistan?s outgoing ambassador Zamir Akram, attended Shiva Ratri celebrations at Kathmandu?s Pashupatinath temple and met Singhal who came last month with the assurance that millions of Hindus worldwide supported the royal coup in Nepal. Also in the doghouse, along with the Indian envoy, is the British ambassador, Keith George Bloomfield, whose request for a royal audience has also been put on hold since last month. But though the US had joined forces with India and the UK to express concern at the royal takeover and urge for the restoration of multi-party democracy, the American ambassador, James Francis Moriarty, has been given preferential treatment with the king granting him a meeting within less than ten days days of a request. This despite the fact that Moriarty also sought to meet Nepal?s top political leaders who have been under arrest since the royal coup on February 1. Both the American and Indian ambassadors were prevented from meeting former PM and opposition leader Girija Prasad Koirala and other detainees, a prevention that hit the headlines in Nepal and abroad and triggered a formal letter from Nepal?s foreign ministry to diplomatic missions.