Rapper-turned-politician Balendra Shah’s centrist Nepal RSP party won a majority in direct parliamentary elections, partial official results showed Sunday, and was heading for a landslide according to official trends.
The 35-year-old Rastriya Swatantra Party (RSP) also topped the proportional representation poll, according to the declared results and trends of the Election Commission.
The vote was the first since the deadly anti-corruption youth protests of September 2025 that toppled the government.
Shah himself had defeated veteran four-time Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli – whose Marxist government was toppled in last year’s violence – in his own seat on Saturday.
His victory over Oli, 74, and his rise from mayor of the capital to potential prime minister constitutes one of the most spectacular achievements in recent Nepali politics.
Youth-led protests in September 2025, under a large Gen Z banner, began following a brief social media ban, but quickly tapped into broader grievances over corruption and a struggling economy.
Thursday’s elections chose a new 275-member House of Representatives, the lower house of Parliament, with 185 seats chosen directly and 110 by proportional representation.
Poll observers, the Asian Network for Free Elections, said Sunday that the vote took place “peacefully and in an orderly manner and reflected the public’s continued engagement in democratic processes despite recent political instability.”
“Necessary actions”
As of Sunday afternoon, 153 direct elections have been declared: the RSP leads with 117, the Nepali Congress with 17 and Oli’s Marxists, now defeated, trails with seven.
Former Maoist guerrilla commander Pushpa Kamal Dahal, a three-time prime minister, won his seat, with his party holding seven in total.
Trends showed Shah’s RSP also leading in eight of the remaining 12 constituencies in the direct elections.
In the proportional representation vote, the RSP was in the lead with almost half of the votes counted – but the final results could take several more days.
The Nepali Congress, the largest party in the previous coalition government, also saw its new leader, Gagan Thapa, defeated by the RSP.
“The counting is progressing smoothly in all the remaining constituencies,” said Election Commission spokesperson Narayan Prasad Bhattarai. AFP.
“The results of all direct votes are expected by the end of the day, proportional representation votes will take a few more days.”
First-time MP Shah walked the streets of his new constituency on Saturday evening, wearing his signature black sunglasses and waving from the sunroof of a car in a victory parade amid an enthusiastic crowd chanting “Balen” – as he is better known.
Shah, who did not give a speech, won more than three times as many votes as Oli, who congratulated the winner, wishing him “a peaceful and successful five-year term”.
The commission of inquiry formed by the Nepalese government to investigate the deadly violence of September 2025 also submitted its report on Sunday.
No one has yet been held responsible for these deaths.
Its findings have not yet been made public, but they have been handed over to Sushila Karki, the acting Prime Minister,
Commission member Bigyan Raj Sharma told reporters that the team interviewed more than 200 people and submitted a 900-page report, with more than 8,000 more pages added.
“We tried to conduct an investigation for September 8 and 9,” he said.
“Based on what we saw, understood and verified through the evidence, we provided our opinions and recommendations. This is now the property of the government, and the government will take necessary action.”
Oli denied ordering security forces to open fire on protesters and said AFP that he blames the violence on “infiltrators.”
