What is in a name?

Pushpa Kamal Dahal, the Maoist leader, may know it much better than anyone else.

A stroke of the pen on March 7 last year led to the invalidation of the Nepal Communist Party (NCP), awarding the CPN (Maoist Centre) back to Dahal and leaving him high and dry.

The reason was simple. A party with the same name had already been registered by Rishiram Kattel.

Kattel moved the Supreme Court, arguing that the registration of the Nepal Communist Party (NCP) by Dahal and KP Sharma Oli, the chair of the CPN-UML, at the Election Commission, was illegal. The court agreed and returned the Nepal Communist Party to Kattel.

But no one is talking about Kattel’s Nepal Communist Party as local elections are approaching. His party has been struck off by the poll commission because the issue is still sub judice.

According to the Election Commission, there are 79 parties that are registered for the May 14 local elections.

However, only a handful of parties have got people’s attention.

The UML, Nepali Congress, CPN (Maoist Centre), CPN (Unified Socialist), Janata Samajbadi Party, Loktantrik Samajbadi Party, Rastriya Prajatantra Party, and Rastriya Prajatantra Party Nepal are some of the political forces which people have found interest in. And these are the parties which are mostly getting space in the media.

While most of those registered have some common names with “communist” or “samajbadi” tags, there are some quirky ones which many may not have even heard of.

Take this for an example.

A party that has registered itself with the commission for local elections is called Maulik Jarokilo Party. The party is registered in the name of Sushil Gautam.

It has fielded candidates in Dharan Sub-metropolitan City, Sunsari; Triyuga Municipality and Belaka Municipality in Udayapur; Chandrapur Municipality, Rautahat; Tripurasundari Rural Municipality, Dhading; Tandi Rural Municipality, Nuwakot; Kageshwari Manohara Municipality, Kathmandu; Kathmandu Metropolitan City; and Changunaryayan Municipality, Bhaktapur.

Another party with a peculiar name is Aamul Pariwartan Masiha Party, Nepal. It is registered in the name of Bharat Giri.

It has also fielded candidates in about a dozen local units.

Some other parties whose names many may find interesting are

Miteri Party, Nepal, registered in the name of Dhanendra Bahadur Basnet; Nepalbad Party of Kiran Kumar Sharma Poudel; Aadhunik Nepal Samajbadi Party of Krishna Gopal Banjara; and Rastriya Yetharthabadi Party, which is registered in the name of Bishnu Bahadur Karki.

Yagya Bhattarai, a joint secretary at the Election Commission, says there are certain criteria about party names, or else it accepts any name political outfits come up with.

“Parties themselves propose their names. First of all we check if any other party is registered with the same name,” said Bhattarai. “If not, we accept the proposed names unless they seem to be giving out any communal message.”

To check all the parties registered for May 13 local polls, visit: https://election.gov.np/admin/public//storage/Local%20Election/Press%20Release/finalpress%20release.pdf