Kathmandu, July 30 - A 72-year-old history scholar and a former student of India's elite Doon School is being considered for the post of Nepal's new ambassador to India.

Rukma Shumsher Jung Bahadur Rana, a scion of one of the oldest and best-known families of Nepal, could be Nepal's new ambassador to India, a post that fell vacant almost eight months ago after the then Maoist-led government of Nepal recalled ambassador Durgesh Man Singh.

'Our family is not like the (commonly perceived) Rana family of Nepal,' Rukma Shumsher told IANS.

His father Subarna Shumsher Jung Bahadur Rana was the first finance minister of Nepal and one of the founders of the Nepali Congress party that led the pro-democracy movement of 1950 against the all-powerful Rana prime ministers.

Rukma Shumsher has close ties with India.

'My family was exiled thrice,' he said. 'We lived in Kolkata.'

After studying in the prestigious Doon School, Rukma Shumsher graduated from Kolkata's St Xavier's College run by the Jesuit fathers, followed by a Masters degree in modern history from Calcutta University.

He was also the past president of the Nepal Olympics Committee and current managing director of Dabur Nepal, Dabur India's subsidiary in the Himalayan republic.