Fugitive wins seat in Nepal parliament

KATHMANDU: A fugitive wanted over a deadly attack on police won a seat in Nepal’s national parliament on Tuesday, despite being in hiding and not once appearing in public during his campaign.

Resham Chaudhary won the seat from Kailali in western Nepal by a landslide, securing more than double the votes of his closest rival, according to results from the election commission. Chaudhary has been in hiding since 2015 when he was accused of masterminding an attack in which eight police officers and a toddler were killed.

"He is in our wanted list and we can arrest him even though he has been elected as a member of parliament, if we find him," said police spokesman Manoj Neupane. Chaudhary was a key figure in violent protests that erupted in 2015 over a contentious new constitution.

Ethnic minority groups from across Nepal’s southern lowlands took to the streets demanding changes to the charter, which they say leaves them politically marginalised. Around 50 people died in clashes between protesters and police that led to a blockade of the border with India and a crippling shortage of goods in landlocked Nepal.