Gagan Thapa

Gagan Kumar Thapa (born 19 July 1976) is a Nepali politician and youth leader, who is the current General Secretary of the Nepali Congress.

Born and raised in Kathmandu, Thapa graduated from Siddhartha Vanasthali School in 1992.

He finished his Bachelors of Science in Chemistry from Tri Chandra College in 1998.

Thapa was the president of the Free Student Union of Tri Chandra College from 1998 to 2000.

He was a Committee Member of the Nepal Students Union from 1998 to 2002, Vice President from 2000 to 2002, and its General Secretary from 2002 to 2004.

After the dissolution of Parliament and declaration of emergency by King Gyanendra, Thapa took a vehement stand against the royal regime and called for the establishment of a republic.

He called for greater involvement of youth in the movement, and called on students to take to the streets to launch a decisive movement for the restoration of democracy.

He completed his M.A. in Sociology from Tribhuvan University in 2003.

He was jailed on charges of sedition in 2004.

On 26 April 2005, he and two other NSU activists were arrested but released on 5 May after the Supreme Court deemed their detention illegal.

Thapa was immediately rearrested and served with a 90-day detention order under the Public Security Act (PSA).

He was declared a Prisoner of Conscience by Amnesty International.

Following a Special Court order in July 2005, Thapa was arrested from the Singha Durbar Ward Police Station where he had gone to meet his colleagues, and was subsequently interrogated by The Office of the Kathmandu District Government Attorney for his involvement in 'offense against the state' by chanting anti-monarchy slogans at a rally.

Following immense international pressure, Thapa was released in August 2005.

The same month, Thapa announced his candidacy for the President of the Nepal Student Union (NSU), the student wing of the Nepal Congress Party (NC).

Thapa was excluded from the race by Nepal Congress Party President, Girija Prasad Koirala, on charges of being 'agents of the palace' alongside NC Central Member Narhari Acharya.

In January 2006, Thapa urged the youth to boycott the municipal polls.

The democracy movement succeeded in April.

In May, he called for leaders of political parties to make public their personal property.

Thapa was seen as an advocate of peaceful protests.

On 2 July 2006, Thapa in an interview with BBC News on the fifth anniversary of Nepalese royal massacre asserted that "..The Nepalese have begun writing a new autobiography for Nepal, an autobiography with a vision, philosophy and an ideology; a distinct autobiography with socio-economic and cultural harmony and prosperity; an autobiography displaying the life and history of the common men and women of Nepal."

He also continued advocate for the abolition of monarchy throughout 2006.

During the 12th National Convention of the NSU in 2007, Thapa pulled out his candidacy for the post of President, claiming that "The NC leadership has remained biased against me and therefore I have declared that I would not contest".

Gagan Thapa was elected to the First Constituent Assembly (CA) under the party-list proportional representation system from Nepali Congress.

He served in the Fundamental Rights and Directive Principle of the Constituent Assembly and the Natural Resources and Means Committee of the Legislative Parliament.

He is currently serving as a Member of Parliament in the House of Representatives, Nepal from Kathmandu since 2008, and is currently in its Parliamentary Committee on Education and Health.

He was elected for the first time as a Member of the First Constitutional Assembly from 2008 elections from proportional representation.

During the 10th General Convention of the NSU in Pokhara, there were fights between the Koirala faction and the Thapa faction.

Thapa accused the party leadership of preventing the closed-door session from being held to forestall adoption of a pro-republican agenda

Thapa won a seat in the Central Working Committee of Nepali Congress in the 12th National Convention held in 2010, receiving the highest number of votes.

From the 12th General Convention of the Nepali Congress, became Central Committee Member of the Nepal Congress.

He won the 2013 elections as a Member of the Second Constitutional Assembly following the failure of the first assembly to promulgate a constitution, serving as the Health Minister from 2016 to 2017.

Thapa was elected as a Member of Parliament of the Second Constituent Assembly following election in November 2013, following the failure of the first CA. Thapa won from Kathmandu-4 with 22,336 votes against candidates Nirmal Kuikel of CPN (UML) (9,028 votes) and Nanda Kishor Pun (Pashang) of the UCPN Maoists (6,462 votes).

He was also chairman of the Agriculture and Water Resources Committee.

He urged for the formation of a commission to settle issues of provincial boundaries with the mandate to demarcate provincial boundaries quickly, adding that the new constitution should be promulgated without finalizing the boundaries of proposed provinces.

Thapa also pushed the government to address the Madhes agitation by addressing the demands of Madhes, further blaming the government for promoting black marketing in the face of the 2015 Nepal Blockade and the Terai unrest, right after the 2015 Earthquake.

He served as the Minister of Health and Population of Nepal from 2016 to 2017.

He won in 2017 for the 2nd time from Kathmandu 4.

He won for third time from the same constituency in 2022.

Thapa was born in a conservative middle-class family.