Since Sunday morning, news spread that UML Vice-Chairman and former Finance Minister Bishnu Poudel, who is considered 'smart' in communist politics, would contest the upcoming House of Representatives elections from Palpa-2. But by evening, the scenario had changed.*

Why did Poudel, who has been active in politics since 2033, try to return to Palpa, the same district where he entered parliamentary politics, after 31 years?

Born in the then Putlibazar VDC (present-day Putlibazar Municipality) of Syangja, Poudel started his parliamentary politics from Palpa. In 2051 BS, Poudel, who contested the election from the then constituency no. 3 of Palpa, was defeated by Congress candidate Surya Prasad Pradhan by 664 votes. While Pradhan received 23,697 votes, Poudel received 23,033 votes.

Since then, Poudel has won 4 consecutive elections from Rupandehi-2. In 2064 BS, Poudel defeated Bhakti Pandey of the Maoists from the then Rupandehi-4 by 2,459 votes. Poudel had received 15,880 votes.

In 2070, the Maoists fielded former Prime Minister Baburam Bhattarai as their candidate. The competition between Bhattarai and Poudel became interesting in a constituency dominated by intellectuals, industrialists, and businessmen. However, Poudel defeated Bhattarai by a margin of 7,643 votes. While Poudel polled 19,577 votes, Bhattarai polled only 11,934 votes.

In 2074, Poudel polled 44,09 votes from the constituency that became Rupandehi-2 and was elected. Yubaraj Giri of the Nepali Congress polled 21,946 votes. Poudel, who had been continuously increasing his margin of victory, won by a narrow margin in 2079 even though his rival candidate was weakened due to internal conflicts.

In 2079, when there was no Congress candidate and the candidacy of Raju Gurung, who was considered a strong candidate of the CPN-UML, which was formed after the split, was rejected, leader Poudel was optimistic about winning easily. However, Ganesh Poudel of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) became the closest competitor. While Poudel of the UML got 27,165 votes, Poudel of the RSS got 25,781 votes. Poudel, who was excited after defeating former Prime Minister Bhattarai by a margin of more than 7,000 votes in 2074, was disappointed when he won by a margin of only 1,366 votes in 2079.

After winning 4 consecutive elections, Poudel continued to face dissatisfaction within the party and the anger over the shifting of the capital of Lumbini province from Butwal to Dang. Poudel, who was facing criticism and humiliation after the capital of Bhalubang was shifted from Butwal to Bhalubang, was in further trouble when party chairman KP Oli made a statement at a public meeting held by UML in Butwal in Chaitra 2081, sending a message that he had supported the move of the capital in front of Bishnu Poudel.

On the one hand, there was the humiliation of not being able to keep the capital in Butwal, and on the other hand, there was a strong faction of internal competition between Vice Chairman Poudel and General Secretary Shankar Pokharel that had reached the ward and tole committees. Despite the internal competition within the party and the growing anger towards each other over the capital issue, both leaders continued to work on bringing it to the lower committees from the cadres. Because of that, the UML organization in both Rupandehi and Dang districts is continuously weakening.

Both leaders had experienced the internal factionalism, local dissatisfaction and the fact that they could not win elections from an organization that was weakening due to this from the 2079 election results. The 'battle of the ants' between the two leaders ended with General Secretary Shankar Pokharel losing by a narrow margin from Dang-2 in the 2079 election. Although he won by a smaller margin than expected, by 2082, Poudel also felt the effects of it. That is why there was talk among the workers that Poudel wanted to leave Butwal, which is developing rapidly as a role model through the construction of large infrastructure on his own initiative, and go to Palpa-2.

UML worker and ward chairman of Butwal Sub-metropolitan City-10, Bal Bahadur Pun said that Poudel's decision to contest from Palpa was wrong. 'There is no alternative to Bishnu Poudel in Rupandehi-2. It is not only us here, our friends from the Congress are also disappointed,' he said, 'I am confident that the decision will be confirmed by Tuesday. He should contest from here.' Without saying anything, Poudel decided to contest from Rupandehi on Sunday evening.

Till Friday morning, Poudel was preparing to contest the election from Rupandehi-2. Accordingly, the work of opening an office for election mobilization in Butwal and preparing all the election mobilization teams was going on at a rapid pace. Poudel, who had been contesting the election by renting a person's house in the previous elections, was planning to stay in a hotel in Butwal and organize the election this time. According to sources, his secretariat was working on renting a room in the hotel and keeping a computer, and preparing the necessary materials and manpower for the election mobilization.

Due to the internal faction of the two leaders, there was a sharp division of cadres from the mass organizations of the UML in Butwal to the organizations. The cadres of both parties were seen in a campaign to defeat and weaken each other. Its direct impact was being felt in the party organization.

In the UML Rupandehi District Committee, about a dozen leaders were dominant on the side of Shankar Pokharel. Poudel was doing the same in Dang. The dominance of both factions was also seen in the selection of representatives for the 11th UML General Convention. Due to the direct confrontation between the two leaders, Pokharel has not been able to determine his constituency in Dang even till Sunday. According to a leader from UML Dang, Pokharel's constituency is Dang-2. However, there is also talk of Pokharel leaving 2 and moving to Dang-1.