Intense Political Battle Expected in Humla as Diverse Candidates Vie for Seats

Humla, a remote Himalayan district in Karnali Province, is set for an interesting electoral contest this time around. With 11 candidates filing their nominations in Humla, the key contenders include Dr. Dipendra Rokaya from the CPN (Maoist Centre), Dal Phadera from the CPN-UML, and Jayapati Rokaya from the Nepali Congress.

Also in the electoral fray are Jathil Karki from the Progressive Democratic Party (PrLoPa) and Tashi Lhamo from the Rastriya Swatantra Party (RSP), among others. 

The Nepali Congress candidate, Rokaya, is a former district president of the party. Although he was a proportional representation candidate in 2079 BS, he failed to secure a seat. He is currently a provincial committee member of the party. UML's Phadera is a leader who won the rural municipality chairmanship in 2074 BS but was defeated when he contested for the same post again in 2079 BS. Furthermore, he was defeated even after securing a ticket for the Provincial Assembly election in 2079 BS.

In the province, he is a leader of the Gorakh Bogati faction. He managed to secure the ticket again due to Bogati's strong influence. For this reason, Dal Rawal could not secure the ticket.

The CPN (Maoist Centre) has nominated Dr. Dipendra Rokaya as its candidate. Rokaya was actually preparing to contest the 2079 BS election, but Prachanda stopped him at that time and gave the ticket to Chhiring Dhandul. Rokaya is known within the Maoist party as an intellectual and honest young leader.

As a member of the Karnali Planning Commission, he put forward the 'Karnali Development Model' by formulating Karnali's first five-year master plan. He worked as a war journalist during the 10-year armed conflict and is also an author. In his book 'Karnali ko Marma' (The Essence of Karnali), which relates to the history of Karnali, he has covered Karnali's present and future plans. Although he is seen as a strong candidate, it is estimated that Sahidputra Jathil, who is contesting from PrLoPa—a party split from the Maoists—will cause a loss of votes for the CPN (Maoist Centre).

Jathil, 30, had his father arrested and killed by the then government in Jestha 2058 BS. In 2070 BS, he became involved with the Maoist-aligned student organization, serving as a member of the Valley District Committee, Secretariat Member, and eventually becoming the Chief Secretary of the CTEVT National Committee. He was elected Deputy General Secretary in the previous national conference.

Similarly, the candidacy of Tashi from the RSP puts pressure on the three major parties. Humla has a total voter base of 34,372. Due to geographical remoteness and the fact that most residents are outside the district, voter turnout here is very low. However, it has long been assessed that the candidate who can appease the Lama community voters can win the election here. 

RSP nominated Tashi because there were no candidates from that community in other parties. She was preparing to become a minister from the Janajeevan (People's Life) under the government led by former Prime Minister Sushila Karki. However, there was a controversy surrounding her name. Later, she was included in the proportional representation closed list from the RSP. But after her name was removed from there, the RSP nominated her as a direct candidate and sent her to Humla. She is a climate activist.

Past Results

In the 2079 BS election, Chhiring Dhandul Lama of the CPN (Maoist Centre), who had the support of the Nepali Congress, won the election with 14,471 votes.

UML's Dal Rawal received 9,516 votes, while the RPP candidate received only 378 votes. In that election, there were only three direct candidates. However, in the proportional representation category, the Nepali Congress received the highest number of votes at 8,192, followed by the CPN (Maoist Centre) with 7,363, the CPN-UML with 5,907, and the CPN (Unified Socialist) with 1,021 votes. In the Provincial Assembly proportional representation, the CPN (Maoist Centre) is first, the Nepali Congress second, and the CPN-UML third.

If the votes received by the CPN (Maoist Centre) and the Unified Socialist are combined from that time, the CPN (Maoist Centre) is the leading party now. In Humla, which has 7 local levels, the CPN-UML has not won a single local level election. The Nepali Congress and the CPN (Maoist Centre) each won 3 local levels, while one independent candidate won one. In the Provincial Assembly as well, in (1), Maoist's Ransingh Pariyar won the election with 6,481 votes, while independent (Congress rebel) candidate Mangal Bahadur Shahi came in second with 4,630 votes. Phadera, the current UML candidate, received only 2,098 votes.

In (2), influential Congress leader Jivan Bahadur Shahi won the election. He received 7,056 votes, while CPN-UML's Chhamba Bahadur Lama received 2,979 votes.