Nepal Provinces

Nepal is a long, thin country, about eight hundred kilometres from east to west and rarely more than two hundred wide, and its seven provinces are cut as strips that run from the plains on the Indian border up to the Himalaya. They date from the 2015 constitution, which replaced the old zones and development regions, so an older map will not match.

The quiz: Name to place, on the map
Grouped by: An unofficial cut of the country: east, centre and west
In the game: 7 provinces

Start

What you are looking at

The provinces (pradesh) of Nepal, the first tier of the federal country. Most are named for a river or a region: Koshi for the river in the east, Bagmati for the one that flows through Kathmandu, Gandaki, Karnali, and Madhesh for the southern plains. Lumbini takes its name from the Buddha's birthplace, and Sudurpashchim means the far west.

Nepal has no official grouping above the provinces, so the groups are a cut made for drilling: east, centre and west. They are a way to learn the map a piece at a time, not a classification. The provinces are the Nepal Districts grouped, so the borders of the two maps match exactly.

How to place one

Start with the east. Koshi holds the country's eastern end and the mountain border with Sikkim, and Madhesh is the narrow plain south of it.
Find the middle. Bagmati, with Kathmandu, is the one most people can already place, and Gandaki lies to its west.
Read the west as three. Lumbini runs along the southern plain, and Karnali, the largest, sits behind it in the mountains.
End at the corner. Sudurpashchim is the far western province, against the Indian border.

Every province, by group

East2 provinces: Koshi, Madhesh
Centre2 provinces: Bagmati, Gandaki
West3 provinces: Karnali, Lumbini, Sudurpashchim

Worked examples

Karnali

The biggest of them

Karnali is the largest province and one of the least populated, a block of high mountain in the north west with no road link to the plains for much of its history.

Madhesh

The smallest of them

Madhesh is the smallest province by area and the most densely settled, a strip of the Terai plain along the southern border.

Frequently asked questions

How many provinces does Nepal have?

Seven, created by the 2015 constitution when Nepal became a federal republic.

What is below the province?

77 districts, which are their own quiz. Beneath those sit hundreds of local governments, which are not in the game.

The tier below this one is Nepal Districts. For another country at this level, see Bangladesh Divisions.

Sources

OCHA, Nepal administrative boundaries, on HDX, the boundaries; the provinces are the districts dissolved, so the two maps share every border
Provinces of Nepal, the seven provinces and their names

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