Patan (Lalitpur): Nepali Congress (NC) President and former Prime Minister, Sher Bahadur Deuba, has termed Pradeep Giri as the second most intellectual socialist analyst after the party's founding leader BP Koirala. 

In his address to a programme organised in commemoration of the first death anniversary of Giri at the NC central office, Sanepa, today, the NC President said,"He (Giri) is the second most prominent intellectual and socialist thinker after the late BP.  I personally assess him as a tireless person." 

He was a voracious reader and a writer with wits, Deuba said of Giri, promising to support from the party level to publish his works if they are released posthumously. 

Also speaking on the occasion, NC general secretary Gagan Kumar Thapa said Giri was among those intellectuals who possessed a profound consciousness of history. "He always encouraged us to keep oneself updated about history to anlayse the social, political and economic dimensions of the given society and find out ways for addressing current challenges." 

Thapa remembered the late leader as an eloquent speaker endowed with wit. 

NC joint general secretary Mahalaxmi Upadhya 'Dina' said Giri was in politics for change and not for holding the post.  

Bharati Silwal Giri, the spouse of the late Giri, said with the passing of the leader, she felt his absence in the democratic socialist movement. He was always eager to see positive transformation in the NC, sometimes voicing his reservations to the party policies and actions, she added.