By Our Reporter
The by-elections to the House of Representatives held on April 23 in three constituencies in Bara-2, Chitwan-2 and Tanahun-1 have come as a big blow to the major two parties—the Nepali Congress and the CPN-UML. While the Nepali Congress lost the seat of Tanahun-1, from where President Ram Chandra Paudel was elected in November 20 poll, to Rastriya Swatantra Party’s Dr. Swarnim Wagle, the UML fared worse than in the elections held five months ago both in Chitwan and Tanahun. Dr.Wagle won with 34,911 votes while his close rival Govinda Bhattarai got 20,122 votes in Tanahun-1. The vote difference between Wagle and Bhattarai is 14,789. UML candidate Sarbendra Khanal got only 8,448 votes.
The combined votes received by the UML and NC candidates in Chitwan were less than half the votes garnered by Lamichhane. While Lamichhane got 54,176 votes, Jit Narayan Shrestha of the NC got 11,214 votes. Lamichhane won the election with a vote margin of 42,962 votes; he secured nearly five times more votes than Shrestha. He received almost 70 per cent of the valid votes, the highest votes both in terms of percentage and vote numbers garnered by any lawmaker of the present House of Representatives.
Similarly, CPN-UNL’s Ram Prasad Neupane got 10,963 votes. In November 20 elections, CPN-UML had garnered 14,000 votes and Lamichhane won by gaining 49,300 votes.
However, in Bara-2, Upendra Yadav managed to win the elections by applying all state apparatus. He defeated Janamat Party’s Shiva Chandra Kushahawa with a margin of 5081 votes. Yadav got 28,415 votes and Kushahawa 23, 334 votes. But the same tactics applied by the ruling parties in Chitwan resulted in counter-productive. Although NC candidate Govinda Bhattarai in Tanahun is regarded to be an honest and dedicated leader, he fell prey to the incompetent and corrupt leadership of the party. He was defeated by Dr. Wagle of Rastriya Swatantra Party by a big margin of almost 15,000.
Wagle, one of the brilliant minds of the country, had quit the Nepali Congress only on March 30 after
being unable to bear the injustice meted out against him by NC President Sher Bahadur Deuba and his spouse Arzu Rana. His decision to contest the election from RSP proved right. Now the House of Representatives will have a renowned economist of the world.
Worse was the situation in Chitwan for both the NC and UML. They got less than the votes they had garnered in November polls in all wards of the constituencies.
The by-election has given a clear message that the RSP is going to emerge as the biggest party in the next five years, and its candidates can defeat any powerful candidate of NC and UML in their constituency. Wagle was from Gorkha but won in Tanahun. As such, no leader of the big party will feel safe from RSP candidate in the 2027 elections, at least in the hilly regions. However, in Madhes, the RSP may not pose a threat to the conservative parties, but there is already Janamat Party to terrify the old parties.
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