I guess this is only an opening in क्षेत्र ५ of KTM, but I wished Narhari Acharya won, and it's good to see him with an early lead.

What I gathered from numerous conversations with family and friends in Chhettra 5 over the last few days was that Narhari was clearly the favorite. I even donated for his campaign -- the little I could do from here since I could not go home to cast my vote. However, on the समानुपातिक section of the election, many people I talked to had inclinations -- surprising, but with understandable argument -- to vote for the Maoists. Their reasoning was that since they didn't have clear faith in any of the parties, it might be helpful to push the Maoists into the arena too, so as to make the Assembly more "balanced", specially, they argued, in these times of urgent need for unity based on inclusion. If this reflects the general mood of the nation, Maoists sure do have a shot at becoming an influential party in the CA, albeit obviously without a majority.

Anyway, I obviously could not hide the ecstasy over the successful election despite by new work load that does not allow me to visit Sajha as often as I used to, or as often as I'd like to.