New Delhi: The current ruling party in Nepal, Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba led Nepali Congress led emerged as the single largest party in Nepal on Sunday. The party maintained its lead by securing 53 seats in the parliamentary polls that led to an end of the prolonged political instability that the Himalayan nation witnessed in the last few weeks.
Elections to the House of Representatives (HoR) and seven provincial assemblies were held on November 20 for which the counting of votes started on Monday last week.
The result seems to be in the favour of PM Deuba as the Nepali Congress has won 53 seats in the election while the Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist Leninist) (CPN-UML) won 42 seats. Apart from these two, the CPN-Maoist secured 17 seats and became the third largest party with CPN-Unified Socialist bagging 10 seats.
Meanwhile, Rastriya Swatantra Party (RSP) and pro-Hindu Rastriya Prajatantra Party, both the newly formed parties, have won 7 seats each. Independent and other smaller parties, too, were victorious on 21 seats. However, the results for 8 seats out of total 165 seats are still awaited.
The ruling alliance has won 85 seats, while CPN-UML led alliance could secure only 55 seats. The victorius alliance includes the Nepali Congress, Pushpakamal Dahal Prachanda led CPN-Maoist, CPN-Unified Socialist led by Madhav Nepal, Mahantha Thakur led Lokatantrik Samajwadi Party and Chitra Bahadur’s Rashtriya Janamorcha.
As per the Election Commission, “Out of over 17.9 million registered voters, the voter turnout was 61 per cent.”
As of now, around 80 per cent of the votes have been counted, and approximately 2.4 million votes are yet to be counted.
Notably, 165 in the 275-member House of Representatives will be elected through direct voting. The remaining 110 will be elected through a proportional electoral system. A party or a coalition needs 138 seats for a clear majority.
The three former Prime Ministers Prachanda, Oli and Madhav Nepal have been elected to parliament. Deuba and Prachanda met on Saturday at the Prime Minister’s residence in Baluwatar and made a decision to continue ruling five-party alliance.
The end of the decade-long Maoist insurgency has caused a political instability in Nepal’s parliament and no prime minister after 2006 have served a full term in office.
The next government too will have to undergo this challenge of keeping a stable political administration and balancing ties with neighbouring countries including – China and India.