Kathmandu [Nepal], March 7 (ANI): The Rastriya Swatantra Party (RSP), associated with former Kathmandu mayor and rapper Balendra Shah (Balen), maintained a commanding lead in vote counting and appeared headed for a landslide in Thursday’s parliamentary elections. As of Saturday morning, RSP was leading in 98 First-Past-the-Post (FPTP) seats with 19 wins officially declared.
The Election Commission reported counting underway in 135 of the 165 FPTP constituencies. Of the 27 constituencies where counting is complete, RSP has won 19. Counting had not begun in three constituencies for various reasons.
By 8 AM NST, the RSP had 19 confirmed victories and leads in 98 seats. The Nepali Congress was second with four wins and leads in 11 seats. The CPN-UML (led by KP Sharma Oli) had one win and led in 11 constituencies, and the Nepali Communist Party (NCP) also had one win with leads in 11 seats.
In Jhapa-5, Balendra Shah led KP Sharma Oli by a wide margin, securing 34,863 votes to Oli’s 9,068, according to the Election Commission’s 8 AM update. In Sarlahi-4, RSP candidate Amreshkumar Singh trailed Nepali Congress president Gagan Kumar Thapa; the latest count showed Singh with 11,383 votes and Thapa with 6,952.
A total of 68 parties contested the March 5 election, with 3,406 candidates in the FPTP races and 1,270 on the Proportional Representation (PR) lists. Voters also cast ballots for 110 PR seats on March 5. The lower house has 275 seats; a single-party majority requires 138 seats, while a two-thirds majority needs 186 seats.
With FPTP counting underway, RSP is projected to surpass the simple majority threshold. RSP vice-president Dol Prasad Aryal told ANI he expects the party to win an absolute two-thirds majority, saying, “One hundred and eight six. Yes, in total we are expecting one hundred and eighty-six seats in total.”
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