Nepal
Nepal, 2008 to today. Draft, not yet reviewed
Nepal, officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal, is a landlocked country in South Asia. Parliamentary democracy was introduced in 1951 but was twice suspended by Nepalese monarchs, in 1960 and 2005. The Nepalese Civil War in the 1990s and early 2000s resulted in the establishment of a secular republic in 2008, ending the world's last Hindu monarchy. The Constitution of Nepal, adopted in 2015, affirms the country as a federal parliamentary republic divided into seven provinces.
Seat of power: Kathmandu
Rulers
Ram Baran Yadav
President of Nepal, 2008–2015
He served as the first president of Nepal from 23 July 2008 to 29 October 2015, following the declaration of republic in 2008. Yadav was elected as the first President of Nepal in a second round of voting on 21 July 2008.
Portrait of Ram Baran Yadav: Prime Minister's Office, Government of India, GODL-India, file
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Bidya Devi Bhandari
President of Nepal, 2015–2023
She served as the second president of Nepal from 2015 to 2023. She is the first woman to hold the presidential office in the country.
Portrait of Bidya Devi Bhandari: Gunjan Raj Giri, CC BY-SA 4.0, file
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Pushpa Kamal Dahal
Prime Minister of Nepal, 2022–2024
He has been the prime minister of Nepal for three terms: from 2008 to 2009, from 2016 to 2017, and again from December 2022 until July 2024. His third term ended on 12 July 2024 after he lost a vote of confidence in parliament.
Portrait of Pushpa Kamal Dahal: Ministry of External Affairs, GODL-India, file
K. P. Sharma Oli
Prime Minister of Nepal, 2024–2025
He served three terms as the prime minister of Nepal, from 2015 to 2016, 2018 to 2021, and 2024 to 2025. Following the deaths of students during the anti-corruption Gen Z protests in 2025, he was overthrown from his post.
Portrait of K. P. Sharma Oli: Prime Minister's Office, GODL-India, file
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Culture
- Nepal has a diverse geography, including fertile plains, subalpine forested hills, and eight of the world's ten highest mountains, including Mount Everest, the highest point above mean sea level on Earth.
- Nepal is a multi-ethnic, multi-lingual, multi-religious, and multi-cultural sovereign state, with Nepali as the official language.
- The centrally located Kathmandu Valley is intertwined with the culture of Indo-Aryans, and was the seat of the prosperous Newar confederacy known as Nepal Mandala.
- Nepal was admitted to the United Nations in 1955, and friendship treaties were signed with India in 1950 and China in 1960.
Picture
Singha Durbar, built in June 1908 by Chandra Shumsher Jung Bahadur Rana, houses administrative offices of the Government of Nepal, but its main building was destroyed in the Gen Z protests in 2025.
Image: Krish Dulal at Nepali Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0, file
Sources
Text adapted from the Wikipedia articles listed as sources, CC BY-SA 4.0.