Current Analysis Status for the Inclusive Neutral Current $\pi^{0}$ Production Cross section Measurement with the NOvA Near Detector

NOvA (NuMI Off-axis $\nu_{e}$ Appearance) experiment is designed to study long-baseline neutrino oscillations. It uses two detectors, the Near Detector (ND) at Fermilab and the Far Detector (FD) at a distance 810 km in Northern Minnesota. NOvA looks for the $\nu_{e}$ appearance at the FD using a narrow band $\nu_{\mu}$ beam peaked at 2 GeV in energy. Neutral Current (NC) interactions with a $\pi^{0}$ in the final state represents the main background in the $\nu_{e}$ appearance measurement. The $\pi^{0}$ decay into two photons can fake the $\nu_{e}$ appearance either due to merging of two photon showers or one of the two photons escaping the detection. Therefore, a complete understanding of $\nu_{\mu}$ induced NC interactions with a $\pi^{0}$ in the final state is very important. It will also help in reducing the background uncertainties for current and future long-baseline neutrino oscillation experiments. We will present the status of the analysis related to the inclusive NC $\pi^{0}$ production cross section measurement with the NOvA ND.