KATHMANDU, MARCH 10 With the counting for direct election (First-Past-The-Post) for the House of Representatives completed and that for proportional representation (PR) in the final stage, the Rabi Lamichhane-led Rastriya Swatantra Party seems slated to win a parliamentary supermajority. The final results of the HoR elections on March 5, which elected 164 members of Parliament using the direct system and 110 using the proportional system, have yet to be officially announced. The result of one constituency is pending, as the EC suspended the final result for the Dhanusha-1 constituency after RSP's Kishore Sah Kamal's candidature was annulled two days before the election based on a complaint that he had been blacklisted for banking offences. Sah filed a writ petition in the Supreme Court against the EC's decision. In response, the Supreme Court issued a show-cause order to the EC yesterday, requiring it to submit a written response within seven days. The court has set the next hearing for March 13. As of 11:00am today (Wednesday), over 10.7 million votes had been counted in the proportional representation (PR) election, with the RSP garnering 5,088,078 votes. Section 60 of the 2017 House of Representatives Election Act addresses the results of proportional elections. According to subsection 11 of the aforementioned section, 'Only candidates from parties that receive a three per cent threshold or more of the total number of votes cast under the proportional electoral system shall be elected.' About 48 per cent of the PR votes have gone to the RSP thus far, followed by the Nepali Congress (NC) at 16 per cent, the CPN-UML at 14 per cent and the Nepali Communist Party (NCP) at seven per cent. The Shram Sanskriti Party (SSP), led by Harka Sampang Rai, has received three per cent, and the Rastriya Prajatantra Party (RPP) has garnered three per cent. The Election Commission has reported that voters nationwide have cast close to 11 million proportional votes. The percentage of votes each party has received so far suggests no significant difference.

Political Party	Win (FPTP: 165 seats)	PR votes (110 seats)	PR win % (approx)	Total seats FPTP+PR
Rastriya Swatantra Party (RSP)	125	5,139,235	48pc Related Articles RSP's Ranju Darshana leads in Kathmandu-1 Kathmandu DAO urges disciplined Holi celebrations amid election code (58-59 seats)	183-184
Nepali Congress (NC)	18	1,749,583	16pc (19-20 seats)	37-38
CPN-UML	9	1,448,854	14pc (15-16 seats)	24-25
Nepali Communist Party (NCP)	7	8,058,773	7pc (8 Seats)	15
Shram Sanskriti Party (SSP)	3	378,649	3pc (4 seats)	7
Rastriya Prajatantra Party (RPP)	1 (Gyanendra Shahi)	3,29,472	3pc (4 seats)	5
Independent	1 (Mahabir Pun)

Note: As of 11:00 AM PR votes, the table has been updated. Total Count: 1,07,39,115

How are seats determined in PR? The Election Commission will be using the modified Sainte-Laguë method, a widely-used mathematical formula, for allocating PR seats to the parties. In this formula, the total party votes polled by a party that secures at least three per cent of votes are divided by a sequence of odd numbers starting with one (that is, one, three, five, seven, nine, 11, 13, 15 and so on) until enough quotients are found to allocate all 110 House of Representatives. While calculating the percentage of all party votes eligible for PR list seats, the EC will exclude the parties that have secured less than three per cent of the total number of valid votes. According to the EC guidelines for proportional elections, the seats are determined by dividing the votes that each party receives based on the number of candidates. Parties must ensure 33 per cent representation of women in the House of Representatives. If the direct system fails to achieve this, proportional representation must be used. Only 13 female candidates were elected, despite the RSP winning 125 seats via FPTP. To achieve 33.33 per cent, the RSP will need to fill a large number of seats through proportional representation. However, political parties will have the privilege of calculating the representation of both Houses of the Federal Parliament at 33 per cent. In accordance with the seats won, the EC will write to the political parties requesting a list of candidates, including representatives from inclusive groups. Following notification of the EC's seat determination, the candidates to be elected should be chosen by the central committee or authorised committee of the relevant party and submitted to the EC. When submitting the list, the party should ensure that it represents Dalits, indigenous peoples, Khas Aryas, Madhesis, Tharus and Muslims in accordance with the percentage specified based on the population and party seat count. The list is required by law to include as much representation from underserved areas and people with disabilities as possible. There is a provision that states that if a party receives less than 10 per cent of the total number of members in proportional representation, it must send a list of candidates that includes at least one-third women. When selecting candidates from inclusive groups, it is not permitted to choose candidates from the lower ranks over the upper ranks. If the list submitted is incorrect or the inclusive group is unsatisfactory, the commission will give the political party another chance to improve. The deposit of the party that does not receive at least one seat through proportional representation will be forfeited. The concerned party may request a refund of the deposit within three months, with the exception of confiscation cases. Based on the methods described above and the number of votes that parties have obtained, it is possible that the RSP will receive 58 or 59 seats, the NC will receive 19 or 20, the CPN-UML will receive 16, the NCP will receive eight, and the RPP and the SSP will each receive four seats.