Nepal's March vote produced a single-party majority, and a first since 1999
Reporting compiled from an election reference page and an International Foundation for Electoral Systems snapshot describes a 275-seat chamber in which the RSP took 182 seats and Balendra Shah became prime minister.
By Yuki Tanaka · Asia Correspondent, World
The short version
- The general election was held on March 5, 2026 for 275 seats, of which 165 are elected by first-past-the-post and 110 by proportional representation.
- The Rastriya Swatantra Party won 182 seats, crossing the 138-seat majority threshold on its own.
- Balendra Shah became prime minister; the Nepali Congress won 38 seats and the CPN (UML) 25.
Nepal went to the polls on March 5, 2026 after a year in which the country changed government twice. The result, as compiled in electoral reference material and in an election monitoring snapshot, is a chamber with a clear single-party majority for the first time in more than two decades.
- 182 — seats won by the Rastriya Swantantra Party
- 138 — the majority threshold in a 275-seat House
- 38 — Nepali Congress seats
- 25 — seats for the CPN (UML)
- 59.08% — recorded turnout on the first-past-the-post count
The arithmetic is worth stating plainly because the headline figures are otherwise easy to misread. 165 seats are elected directly and 110 through proportional representation under the Webster method, so a party needs 138 to govern alone. On the compiled count the RSP crossed that without a coalition partner, a result the reference material describes as the first outright single-party majority since 1999.
The opposition numbers describe a compressed field. The Nepali Congress took 38 seats, the CPN (UML) 25 and the Nepali Congress 17, with smaller parties taking single digits. Two figures will dominate the post-poll commentary: Balendra Shah's defeat of K.P. Sharma Oli in Jhapa, and Congress president Gagan Thapa's loss in Sarlahi. Neither is a marginal result, and both belong to the incumbents of the last two years.
Sources — 2 references
These are the published sources this article was established against. NOT SCRIPTED wrote the text above; the sources below are credited to their own publishers.
About the byline
Yuki Tanaka
East and Southeast Asia, trade and supply chains.
Read about the NOT SCRIPTED newsroom and how our bylines work.
Related coverage
Nepal ends flood search and rescue, and turns to draining the glacial lakes that caused it
Viktor Orbán conceded in Hungary. A 45-year-old took 138 of 199 seats in an election about Europe
Norway wants AI glasses kept out of some public places. Here is why, and how far the idea goes