Kathmandu, March 7 -- In a damning indictment of the established political parties, the three-year-old Rastriya Swatantra Party (RSP) is giving them a run for their money.

As votes of the March 5 polls were being counted on Friday, Gagan Thapa, president of the Nepali Congress, the largest party in the dissolved parliament, was trailing RSP's Amresh Kumar Singh by a wide margin in Sarlahi-4. The margin between RSP's Balendra Shah, the leading candidate in Jhapa-5, and KP Sharma Oli, the chair of the second biggest party in the old parliament, was wider still.

Pushpa Kamal Dahal, the coordinator of the Nepal Communist Party (NCP), was the only one from among the top leaders of the old 'Big Three' to win, this time from Rukum East-1. Yet ...