NC's Rai elected from Ilam-1, RSP's Gurung from Gorkha-1

By Our Correspondent,Ilam, Mar. 10: Young candidate Nishkal Rai of the Nepali Congress has been elected from Ilam Constituency No. 1.

According to the final election results, Rai defeated Binod Nembang of the Shram Sanskriti Party by a margin of 911 votes.

Rai secured 14,543 votes, while Nembang received 13,632 votes. Kajiman Kagate of the CPN-UML came third with 11,966 votes. 

Bimal Gadal of the Rastriya Swatantra Party obtained 9,160 votes, and Ran Bahadur Rai of the Nepali Communist Party received 7,665 votes. A total of 13 candidates were in the fray, and 64,104 votes were cast in Ilam-1. 

Rai, who entered politics from an educational background, has completed a Master’s degree in Management and is currently pursuing an MPhil in Economics. 

The seat had been continuously won by the former CPN-UML leader Jhalanath Khanal since 1990. This victory marks the second win for the Nepali Congress in Ilam-1 after 26 years. No NC candidate had won the seat after Benup Raj Prasai was election in 1999. 

Likewise, young UML leader Suhang Nembang has been elected from Ilam-2. 

Likewise, Rastriya Swatantra Party (RSP) candidate Sudhan Gurung has been elected to the House of Representatives (HoR) member from Gorkha-1.     

According to Election Office Gorkha's information officer Rabilal Subedi, the RSP candidate Gurung secured 29,896 votes, beating his nearest competitor Prem Kumar Khatri of Nepali Congress by 14,498 votes. Khatri secured 15,398 votes.     

Similarly, Hari Raj Adhikari of Nepali Communist Party gained 11,124 votes and CPN (UML) candidate garnered 3,732.