Nepal’s Political History: A Focus on the Past 19 Years

Before 1990

Prior to 1846, Nepal was an absolute monarchy where the king held all power. This changed following the Kot Massacre of September 1846, which ushered in the Rana regime. The Ranas ruled while the king was reduced to a figurehead, and democratic rights were non-existent. A revolution from 1950–51 ended Rana rule and it marked the start of democratic experiment in the following years. Under King Mahendra, the first parliamentary democracy was established in 1959, although significant royal powers remained. The king dissolved parliament and banned parties in the following year. Subsequently, he introduced the Panchayat system  in 1962, a partyless form of rule under the monarchy. However, nationwide student protests in 1979 fueled growing demands for the restoration of democracy. In response, King Birendra relaxed some restrictions and promised reforms. While the Panchayat system remained, political parties were granted more freedom to operate, albeit often underground or in advisory roles. This movement laid the groundwork for the 1990 People’s Movement (Jana Andolan I), which eventually restored multiparty democracy in Nepal.

1990 People’s Movement (Jana Andolan I)

The 1990 People’s Movement (Jana Andolan I) emerged from long-standing grievances against the autocratic Panchayat system, culminating in nationwide protests demanding democracy. This mass movement was significantly shaped by key political leaders from United Left Front (ULF), and Nepali Congress (NC), along with students and professionals. As a result, the movement ultimately succeeded in restoring a multiparty system under a constitutional monarchy.

Civil War & Insurgency (1996–2006)

The country continued to face significant political instability and public dissatisfaction. This turmoil led the Maoists to launch an armed insurgency in 1996, sparking a decade-long civil war. The conflict resulted in thousands of deaths and widespread destabilization, particularly in the countryside. Amid this crisis, political leadership remained volatile. In 2000, Girija Prasad Koirala replaced Krishna Prasad Bhattarai as the prime minister after the latter was forced to resign to avoid a no-confidence motion.

A major turning point occurred with the Royal Palace Massacre, in which King Birendra and much of the royal family were killed. Following this tragedy, King Gyanendra ascended to the throne. He dissolved the government and assumed absolute power in 2005, which invited much public criticism and opposition from political parties. This led to the massive protests of the 2006 People’s Movement (Jana Andolan II), which forced the King to step down in April of that year. Subsequently, Parliament was reinstated, and the signing of the Comprehensive Peace Accord with the Maoists formally ended the decade-long civil war.

The People’s Mandate: Nepal’s Path from Peace Accord to People’s Constitution

• 2007 January: The Interim Constitution of Nepal, 2063 was promulgated, which nullified the Constitution of the Kingdom of Nepal, 2047. The constitution was later amended multiple times (eventually 12) to take practical steps necessary to manage the country’s political transition. The UN Security Council established the United Nations Mission in Nepal (UNMIN) with a mandate that included the monitoring of the management of arms and armed personnel of the Nepal Army and the Maoist rebels.
• 2007 April: The former Maoist rebels joined the interim (coalition) government, led by Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala from the Nepali Congress Party (NCP).
• 2007 July: The Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) – CPN(M) formally got registered for the election.
• 2008 April: A general election for the Constituent Assembly (CA) was held. The CPN(M) party was able to place first in the election but failed to achieve an outright majority.
• 2008 May: The 239 years of Hindu monarchy in Nepal was abolished and Nepal was declared as a federal democratic republic. The assembly had voted overwhelmingly 560 to 4 in favour of abolishing the monarchy. Article 64 of the initial Interim Constitution of Nepal, 2063 had set the term of the Constituent Assembly to be two years from the date of its first meeting. It had also allowed the extension for up to six months by a resolution of the Constituent Assembly. This deadline got extended to 5 years with the help of the 11th amendment to the interim constitution.
• 2008 June: King Gyanendra left the palace.
• 2008 July: Ram Baran Yadav from Nepali Congress became the first president of the republic Nepal. Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala met Yadav and formally submitted his resignation on the same day.
• 2008 August: Pushpa Kamal Dahal from CPN(M) became the first prime minister of the republic Nepal by forming a coalition government. Nepal Congress stayed in opposition. Out of a total 577 votes cast, Dahal received 464 votes, while his opponent Sher Bahadur Deuba of the Nepali Congress party received 113 votes. During Dahal’s tenure, he entered a confrontation with the President Ram Baran Yadav. Dahal had decided to fire the army chief, Rookmangud Katawal and integrate former maoist rebel fighters into the military, a key element of the 2006 peace deal.
• 2009 May: Dahal resigned in May, after holding the office for less than 9 months. The reason was the President overruling Dahal’s decision. Madhav Kumar Nepal of Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist-Leninist) – CPN-UML became the Prime Minister with support of 22 political parties.
• 2010 June: Prime Minister Nepal resigned after 13 months after the Maoists agreed to extend the deadline to write the constitution by one year. Nepal assumed the role of the caretaker until the next prime minister assumed the office.
• 2010 March: Girija Prasad Koirala, a veteran leader and the president of the Nepali Congress Party (NCP), a four time prime minister, and an acting head of state for one tenure, died.
• 2011 January: The UN concluded its peace mission, UNMIN after four years. UNMIN had played an important role in ending the insurgency.
• 2011 February: After 7 months and 17 attempts to elect Nepal’s new PM, Jhalanath Khanal got elected as the new Prime Minister. Nepal was without a functioning government throughout these 7 months.
• 2011 August: PM Jhala Nath Khanal too resigned after being the office bearer for 6 months. Khanal cited that the reason was parties failing to agree on constitution-drafting and the peace process. Unified Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) – UCPN-M leader Dr. Baburam Bhattarai got elected as the new prime minister. Bhattarai was backed by Madhes-based parties and a number of smaller parties.
• 2011 November: After failing to meet the deadline for promulgating a new constitution again, the CA term was extended for the fourth time for six months.
• 2012 May: PM Bhattarai dissolved the CA because it failed to draft a Constitution within the stipulated time, even after four extensions, creating a political vacuum. The dissolution occurred after the Supreme Court refused to grant any more extensions. Bhattarai remained in office as a caretaker prime minister until the next election, which was scheduled for March. Bhattarai stayed on as a caretaker until the upcoming March.
• 2012 June: A faction of CPN-Maoist, led by Mohan Baidya breaks away from the governing party UCPN-Maoist, accusing that Prachanda and Baburam Bhattarai had failed to follow the party’s policy and principles.
• 2013 March: Four major parties (UCPN-M, NCP, CPN-UML, and Samyukta Loktantrik Madhesi Morcha) agreed to form an interim government under the chairmanship of Chief Justice Khil Raj Regmi to hold the second CA election.
• 2013 June: Baburam Bhattarai quits the UCPN-M vice-chair position as a gesture of sacrifice for the welfare of the party and handover the leadership to the new generation.
• 2013 November: The second CA election took place for a new constituent assembly. This time, the UCPN(M) fell from being the single largest party in the last election in 2008, to being in third place. The Nepali Congress party led by Sushil Koirala came in first. The Communist Party of Nepal (UML) came second in the vote. UCPN-M leader Prachanda lost the election in Kathmandu Constituency 10 but won in Siraha Constituency 5 by a thin margin.
• 2014 February: The CPN-UML supported NCP to make Sushil Koirala the next prime minister. In the first meeting of the assembly, the 49-member CA Regulations Drafting Committee elected Laxman Lal Karn as its chair in the first meeting. CPN-UML’s Subash Chandra Nembang was elected as CA speaker. The CA approved the constitution-drafting timetable and set 22 January 2015 as the deadline.
• 2015 January: The ruling coalition had the two-thirds majority in parliament needed to pass a new constitution till the deadline of 22 January 2015 and wanted to pass the constitution through the 2/3 majority. However, the opposition parties wanted the new constitution to be adopted only through consensus among all political parties, and not the majority. On January 20, Maoist and Madhesi lawmakers brawled with ruling party politicians, the infamous picture of smashing chairs inside the parliament happened that day as well. The Maoists warned the ruling parties of further conflict if the ruling parties fail to take opposition views into account. Similarly key civil-society leaders, minority activists, and women’s groups all opposed the ruling coalition’s effort to enforce a constitution through the Constituent Assembly. Hence, due to the lack of consensus, another deadline of 22 January 2015 was not met.
• 2015 April: A devastating earthquake hit Nepal, killing thousands, injuring many more, and leaving hundreds of thousands of buildings destroyed or damaged. In its aftermath, lawmakers and Prime Minister Sushil Koirala came under increasing pressure from both citizens and international donors to finalize the process and redirect their focus toward relief and rebuilding, especially with billions in aid pledged.
• 2015 June: Nepal’s major political parties came together to sign a 16-point agreement aimed at fast-tracking the constitution-drafting process that had been deadlocked since 2008. However, critics argued that the political elite used the disaster as an opportunity to introduce regressive provisions that restrict women’s rights and further marginalize groups.
• 2015 September: The parliament finally approved the Constitution of Nepal, 2072. Its promulgation led to strong protests by minorities in the Terai, resulting in more than 50 The protests arose from objections to federal boundaries. Other provisions of the constitution that were objected to were unfair constituency distribution and restrictions on women’s right to pass citizenship to their children. Many believed these broke earlier commitments, marginalized their communities, and created inequality. Protests resulted in the ‘de facto blockade’, which exacerbated the economic and humanitarian hardship in Nepal at the time when it was struggling to recover from a severe earthquake.
• 2015 October: The PMO of Sushil Koirala’s voluntary resignation led to majority support in the legislature to KP Sharma Oli, making him the prime minister. Following this the legislators voted to elect Onsari Gharti Magar as the first woman speaker of the parliament and Bidhya Devi Bhandari the first woman president.

Party Splits & Power Struggles (2016–2020)

• 2016 June: Baburam Bhattarai formed Naya Shakti Party, asserting it as an alternative force that would go beyond capitalism and communism ideology, and make the country prosperous and developed.
• 2016 July: CPN (Maoist Centre) party pulled out of the governing coalition and Prime Minister K.P. Oli resigns. Subsequently, Pushpa Kamal Dahal (Prachanda) became prime minister for the second time after a power-sharing agreement with the Nepali Congress.
• 2017 April: Six Madhes-based parties merged to form the Rastriya Janata Party Nepal.
• 2017 May: Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal stepped down, honoring the power-sharing agreement with the Nepali Congress and Sher Bahadur Deuba was appointed prime minister for the fourth time.
• 2017 November: Nepal held the national and state-level legislature elections since the promulgation of its new constitution on September 20, 2015. The CPN (Unified Marxist–Leninist) won 121 seats, followed by the Nepali Congress with 63 seats and the CPN (Maoist Centre) with 53 seats.
• 2018 February: Sher Bahadur Deuba stepped down after administering the election for Federal Parliament and Provincial Assemblies. KP Sharma Oli became the prime minister after the coalition of CPN (Unified Marxist–Leninist) and CPN (Maoist Centre).
• 2018 March: Bidhya Devi Bhandari got re-elected as the president of Nepal for the second term.
• 2018 May: CPN (Unified Marxist–Leninist) and CPN (Maoist Centre) merged to form Nepal Communist Party (NCP), with Oli and Prachanda as joint chairmen.
• 2020 December: Prime Minister Oli dissolved the parliament and called for elections 18 months ahead of schedule. The decision was approved by President Bidya Devi Bhandari. The dissolution was allegedly the aftermath of some members of the Dahal faction going to the Parliament Secretariat to register a vote of confidence.

Endless Crisis (2021–2025)

• 2021 February: The Supreme Court overturned Oli’s decision to dissolve parliament, citing insufficient grounds under Articles 85, 76(1), and 76(7), and ordered a parliamentary meeting within 13 days.
• 2021 March: The Supreme Court ruled the Nepal Communist Party’s merger invalid as the name was already registered to a party led by Rishi Kattel. This revived the pre-merger CPN (Unified Marxist–Leninist) and CPN (Maoist Centre).
• 2021 May: Prime Minister K.P. Sharma Oli lost a parliamentary vote of confidence but Oli was reappointed because he was the leader of the party with higher number of seats in the lower house and the opposition failed to demonstrate a majority. Later in the same month President Bidya Devi Bhandari dissolved parliament again on Oli’s claim that he had the support of a majority in the lower house without securing the vote of confidence, and called for elections.
• 2021 July: Sher Bahadur Deuba became the prime minister for the fifth time after the Supreme Court overturned KP Sharma Oli’s decision that he made in May to dissolve the house.
• 2021 August: Faction of Madhav Kumar Nepal split from the CPN-UML and formed to form the Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Socialist), after the Prime Minister Deuba (NC) bypassed the Constitution with an ordinance that allowed political parties to split with only 20% support from the Central Committee and the parliamentary parties. Former Chairman of CPN-UML, Jhala Nath Khanal joined the same party.
• 2022 May: Nepal held local elections, where citizens cast votes for their representatives in 753 local units throughout the country. The mayoral victories of independent candidates in Kathmandu, Dharan, and Dhangadhi signaled the emergence of a new political culture. The independent seats won totaled 385 Nepali Congress secured the most victories with 13,773 seats. The CPN-UML followed with 11,929 wins. The CPN-Maoist Centre finished in third place, securing 5,045 seats, while the Janata Samajbadi Party came in fourth with 1,548 wins.
• 2022 June: Rabi Lamichhane, a celebrated journalist, announced a new political party, Rastriya Swatantra Party (RSP). The party eventually entered the parliament after the 2022 election with 20 seats, making it the fourth largest party in the parliament.
• 2022 November: Nepal held its federal election, Nepali Congress became the leading party with a total of 89 seats, CPN-UML came in second by 78 seats, followed by CPN-Maoist Centre by 32 seats, and RSP secured 20 seats. Elections for the Provincial Assembly (PA) took place on the same day as the federal election. Nepal Congress led in the PA election too.
• 2022 December: Pushpa Kamal Dahal (Prachanda) of the CPN (Maoist Centre) became Prime Minister for the third time through a coalition with seven political parties and some independent MPs, including CPN-UML and RSP, despite Nepali Congress being the largest party and CPN (Maoist Centre) having only 32 seats.
• 2023 March: Nepal elected Ram Chandra Poudel of the Nepali Congress as the President.
• 2024 July: Prime Minister Pushpa Kama Dahal lost the vote of confidence after CPN-UML withdrew its support. The CPN-UML formed a coalition with the Nepali Congress and Khadga Prasad Sharma Oli (CPN-UML) became the Prime Minister for the fourth time.
• 2025 September: Nationwide protests erupted, primarily led by Generation Z youth, demanding government accountability for the social-media ban and an end to corruption. The protests escalated into violence, resulting in at least 72 deaths and over 2,100 injuries. The unrest led to the resignation of Prime Minister K.P. Sharma Oli. Following the resignation, former Chief Justice Sushila Karki was appointed as Nepal’s first female Prime Minister. She also formed an interim government with a mandate to address the issues raised by the protests.