Do we like them?

Do we like Balen Shah?

Our score: 5 out of 10. No harmful words found, a record of getting things done, but heavy-handed moves against poor people and a thin public record on women, LGBTQ+ people and climate.

Balen Shah is the rapper who became a mayor and then a prime minister. He is the youngest person democratically elected to the top job in Nepal and the first from the Madhes region. In the 5 March 2026 election he beat four-time PM K P Sharma Oli in Jhapa-5, and his Rastriya Swatantra Party won 182 of 275 seats. He had earlier turned down a chance to lead the interim government, saying he wanted an elected full term.

The big blot on his mayor years was a nationalism row. In June 2023 he put a 'Greater Nepal' map in his office as a jab at India's Akhand Bharat mural. A constitutional expert called it a “childish act”, while a senior Nepali Congress figure defended Nepal's right to publish its own map. Days later he demanded no Hindi films run in Kathmandu until a line calling Sita a daughter of India was dropped, warning of “irreparable damage to Nepal's national and cultural unity”. It's flag-waving, not hate, but it shows a man who goes big on symbolism.

The stoush that tells you most about his style came in March 2024. Police in Kathmandu's Sundhara area used batons on street vendors, and activists said at least six were seriously injured. Shah, then mayor, defended the police as acting in self-defence and wrote that a woman in a video was a UML cadre, not a vendor. Rights activists wrote to him calling for dialogue instead.

As PM he has run a tight ship in a way that worries critics. He launched a 100-point governance reform plan, introduced a two-day weekend and saw two ministers recalled or resigned within a month, one over an alleged link to a businessman under investigation. Reports say he hasn't held a press conference and that access to his office has become more restricted. In parliament in May he said Nepal had also encroached on Indian land, which opposition MPs challenged as unsupported.

The good stuff is real. Kathmandu got visibly cleaner under his watch: the city hired 300 cleaning workers, put in more bins and began sorting waste at the Teku transfer station, and an urban planner credited the mayor's leadership. Plenty of Nepalis, especially young ones, see him as a break from the old parties. His July meeting with Madhesi leaders shows he'll sit down with those who feel left out.

So where does that leave us? He's a reformer with a hard edge, not a villain. The good-person test is a close call: results on the streets, but a habit of brushing off critics and a thin public record on the issues this page cares about most. Worth watching, not yet worth cheering for.