Administrative Divisions Of Nepal

The first level of country subdivision of Nepal are the provinces. Each province is further subdivided into districts, each district into municipalities and rural municipalities, and each of those municipalities into wards. Before 2015, instead of provinces, Nepal was divided into developmental regions and administrative zones.

Fulfilling the requirement of the new constitution of Nepal in 2015, all old municipalities and villages (which were more than 3900 in number) were restructured into 753 new municipalities and rural municipalities. The former 75 district development committees (DDC) were also replaced by 77 new district coordination committees (DCC) which have much less power than the DDCs. At present there are 6 metropolitan cities, 11 sub-metropolitan cities, 276 municipalities, and 460 rural municipalities.

 

Nepal is composed of seven provinces. They are defined by schedule 4 of the new constitution, by grouping together the existing districts. Two districts however are split in two parts, ending up in two different provinces.

Province	Capital	Governor	Chief Minister	Districts	Area	Pop. (2021)	Density (/km2)	HDI (2019)	GDP per capita (USD; 2021)	Map
Koshi Province	Biratnagar	Parshuram Khapung	Kedar Karki	14	25,905 km2	4,972,021	192	0.597	1,298
Madhesh Province	Janakpur	Hari Shankar Mishra	Saroj Kumar Yadav	8	9,661 km2	6,126,288	767	0.538	882
Bagmati Province	Hetauda	Yadav Chandra Sharma	Shalikram Jamkattel	13	20,300 km2	6,084,042	300	0.673	2,640
Gandaki Province	Pokhara	Prithvi Man Gurung	Khagraj Adhikari	11	21,504 km2	2,479,745	116	0.631	1,348
Lumbini Province	Deukhuri	Amik Sherchan	Jokh Bahadur Mahara	12	22,288 km2	5,124,225	230	0.583	1,209
Karnali Province	Birendranagar	Tilak Pariyar	Yamlal Kandel	10	27,984 km2	1,694,889	61	0.568	1043
Sudurpashchim Province	Godawari	Ganga Prasad Yadav	Kamal Bahadur Shah	9	19,915 km2	2,711,270	136	0.579	1135
Nepal	Kathmandu	President Ram Chandra Poudel	Puspa Kamal Dahal ‘Prachanda’	77	147,641 km2	30,192,480	198	0.602	1,372

 

Provinces are further divided into districts, of which there are 77 (as of 2017). Each of the districts is governed by a District Coordination Committee.

Urban municipalities

Municipalities are places having at least some minimum criteria of population and infrastructure and declared as a municipality by the government. There are 293 municipalities in Nepal.

Urban municipalities are categorized into 3 levels:

• Metropolitan city (Mahanagarpalika)
• Sub metropolitan city (Upmahanagarpalika)
• Municipality (Nagarpalikas)

There are six metropolitan cities; the capital city Kathmandu, as well as Bharatpur, Biratnagar, Pokhara, Lalitpur and Birgunj. There are 11 sub-metropolitan cities and 276 municipalities.

v t e Largest cities or towns in Nepal Central Bureau of Statistics 2021 Nepal census
	Rank	Name	Province	Pop.	Rank	Name	Province	Pop.
Kathmandu   Pokhara	1	Kathmandu	Bagmati	845,767	11	Janakpur	Madhesh	195,438	Bharatpur   Lalitpur
	2	Pokhara	Gandaki	518,452	12	Butwal	Lumbini	195,054
	3	Bharatpur	Bagmati	369,377	13	Tulsipur	Lumbini	180,734
	4	Lalitpur	Bagmati	299,843	14	Budhanilkantha	Bagmati	179,688
	5	Birgunj	Madhesh	268,273	15	Dharan	Koshi	173,096
	6	Biratnagar	Koshi	244,750	16	Nepalgunj	Lumbini	166,258
	7	Dhangadhi	Sudurpashchim	204,788	17	Birendranagar	Karnali	154,886
	8	Ghorahi	Lumbini	201,079	18	Tarakeshwar	Bagmati	151,508
	9	Itahari	Koshi	198,098	19	Gokarneshwar	Bagmati	151,200
	10	Hetauda	Bagmati	195,951	20	Tilottama	Lumbini	149,657

Rural municipalities

Rural municipalities (Gaunpalikas) were established in 2017, replacing the village development committees (VDCs). The main purpose of a gaunpalika resembles that of a VDC, but it has more rights on collection of royalty and taxes and has a higher annual budget than the VDC. Several VDCs were usually combined into each new gaupalika. There are 460 gaunpalikas in Nepal.

• Local self-government in Nepal
• List of mayors of municipalities in Nepal
• List of chairpersons of rural municipalities in Nepal