Nepal

KATHMANDU, Nov 25: Five women candidates have been elected to the House of Representatives (HoR) in the elections held on November 20. According to the data of the Election Commission (EC), women candidates were elected from five constituencies across the country till Thursday evening. According to the EC, Sobita Gautam of Rastriya Swatantra Party was elected from Kathmandu-2 and Toshima Karki from Lalitpur-3, Bidya Bhattarai of CPN-UML from Kaski-2, Rekha Sharma of CPN (Maoist Center) from Dang-2 and Ranjita Shrestha of Nagarik Unmukti Party from Kailali-1.

With few women FPTP candidates, more of them may need to be elected to the upper house to meet the requirement.

Cross-party women politicians have long been lobbying with their leaders to increase the number of female candidates in the first-past-the-post (FPTP) elections. Their efforts to secure one-third women candidates in direct election, however, couldn’t materialise as the parties prioritised male candidates.

Almost all political parties have an extremely lower ratio of women to men candidates fielded under the first-past-the-post category in the upcoming elections.

Kathmandu: The preliminary data released by the Election Commission, the country’s election management body, shows that few women are contesting in the upcoming parliamentary elections in Nepal.

The result announcement of elections held on May 13 have revealed two women candidates as the winners of mayoral elections in two local levels of Rautahat district. 

Reena Kumari Shah and Kaushalaya Devi will hold office as mayors in Maulapur and Ishnath municiaplities in Rautahat. 

The commission rescinded the decision after the political parties protested against the provision stating that it is against existing laws.

The Election Commission has revoked a provision that mentioned that a political party contesting for only the post of either chief or deputy chief of a municipal should compulsorily field a woman candidate.

The 22 years old Saraswati Nepali is the mom of two kids and lives approximately five hours' drive (and five hours walk) away from the headquarter of Karnali Province, Surkhet—a place that paid the heaviest of prices in the 10 year-long armed conflict from 1996-2006. Her first son is eight years old, and her second son is four and half years old, almost as old as her term of office as a ward member in Shiwalaya Rural Municipality (RM) of Karnali Province.