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Balendra Shah, a rapper-turned-politician and the prime ministerial candidate for Rastriya Swatantra Party.
| Photo Credit: Reuters
Nepal’s youngest prime minister took the oath of office Friday after his party won a landslide victory in elections earlier this month and following a youth-led uprising that toppled the government in September.
Balendra Shah was appointed the prime minister by President Ram Chandra Paudel on Friday (March 27, 2026) after his Rastriya Swatantra Party won nearly two-thirds of the seats in the House of Representatives, the lower chamber of parliament, in the March 5 polls.
Mr. Shah was sworn in at 12:34 p.m., on a day when the Himalayan nation is celebrating Ram Navami, to mark the birth of Lord Rama.
Balendra Shah, a structural engineer who rose to fame as a rap artist before becoming Kathmandu’s mayor, leads the Rastriya Swatantra Party, which won about two-thirds of the 275 seats in the bicameral Parliament’s powerful lower House of Representatives.
He emerged as a prominent voice during the bloody youth-led uprising in September that toppled the government in the nation of 30 million people, a wave of unrest that left dozens dead.
Although he didn’t directly participate in the protests, Mr. Shah publicly expressed support for the largely Generation Z demonstrators who led the movement.
Published – March 27, 2026 01:05 pm IST
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Balendra Shah takes oath as Nepal’s prime minister
