District administration in Nepal

District administration makes up the third level of government division in Nepal. The provision for a District Assembly, which acts as the legislature at the district-level, is mentioned in Part 17 of the Constitution of Nepal. The 77 districts of Nepal each have their own district assemblies which in turn elect their own District Coordination Committees, which serves as the executive at the district-level. In addition to this each district also has a District Administration Office which oversees the general administration of each district.

District Administration Office

The District Administration Office is a general administration of government in each district of Nepal. The government of Nepal appoints a Chief District Officer in each district to function as a Chief Administration Officer.
The Local Administration Act, 2028 was implemented to conduct local administration in accordance with the decentralized administration system to effectively operate peace and order. Section 5 of the Local Administration Act was constituted to be a district administration office in every district to conduct general administration of the district. The DAO in each district of Nepal works under Ministry of Home Affairs. The main function of the DAO is to maintain peace, order and security in the district and provide assistance in development activities run by the federal government, provincial government, District Coordination Committee, urban municipality and rural municipality.

Chief District Officer

The Chief District Officer is an administrative rank under Ministry of Home Affairs in Nepal who is appointed by the government as the senior-most executive magistrate and chief in-charge of general administration of a district. The main administration guideline is the Local Administration Act, 1972.
The C.D.O. is responsible for proper inspection of all the departments in a district such as health, education, security and all other government offices. In case of threatened public security conditions like riots, the C.D.O. can mobilize security forces and take other actions like imposing curfew order, fixing restricted area, arresting anyone according to law, hearing some cases as a quasi-judicial body. Distributing the Certificate of Nepalese Citizenship, processing and recommendation for passports, maintaining peace and security, law and order, acting as a representative of government, enjoying the authorities provided by more than 90 prevailing acts make a Chief District Officer powerful.
The C.D.O. is the most powerful position in Nepalese administrative service. Likewise, Assistant Chief District Officers enjoys almost all the authorities as delegated by C.D.O. and other laws.

District Assembly

The District Assembly is composed of chairpersons and vice-chairpersons of each rural municipality and mayors and deputy mayors of each municipality within a district. The District Assembly coordinates between all municipalities and rural municipalities within the district. It elects a nine-member District Coordination Committee including a chief and deputy chief and at least three women and one member from the Dalit or minority communities for a five-year term. Any member within the village or municipal assembly in local levels within the district are eligible to be elected to the District Coordination Committee and if elected their status as a local representative will lapse.

District Coordination Committee

The District Coordination Committee was formed on March 14, 2017, to replace the existing district development committee. Each of the 77 districts in Nepal have their own district coordination committees in.
The Head of a district development committee is elected by the district assembly. The government also appoints a Local Development Officer in each district development committee who heads the DCC in absence of an elected head or deputy head.
The DCC acts as an executive to the district Assembly. The DCC coordinates with the Provincial Assembly to establish coordination between the Provincial Assembly and rural municipalities and municipalities and to settle disputes, if any, of political nature. It also maintains coordination between the provincial and Federal government and among the local bodies in the district. It also monitors development within the district.

List of district coordination committees with their heads

	District	Nepali	Chief District Officer	District assembly chief	Political party	DCC Website	DAO Website
1	Taplejung	ताप्लेजुंग	हिरादेवी पौडेल	Tshiring Lama	CPN
2	Panchthar	पाँचथर	मेखबहादुर मंग्राती
3	Ilam	इलाम	इन्द्रदेव यादव			https://dccilam.gov.np/	https://daoilam.moha.gov.np/
4	Jhapa	झापा	गोपाल कुमार अधिकारी
5	Morang	मोरङ	वीरेन्द्र कुमार यादव
6	Sunsari	सुनसरी	रामचन्द्र तिवारी
7	Dhankuta	धनकुटा	पुण्यविक्रम पौडेल
8	Tehrathum	तेर्हथुम	कृष्ण पौडेल
9	Sankhuwasabha	संखुवासभा	शिव कुमार कार्की	Suman Shakya	CPN
10	Bhojpur	भोजपुर	हरि प्रसाद घिमिरे
11	Solukhumbu	सोलुखुम्बु	देवी पाण्डे
12	Okhaldhunga	ओखलढुङ्गा	चेतराज बराल
13	Khotang	खोटाङ	सन्त बहादुर सुनार
14	Udayapur	उदयपुर	जनार्दन गौतम	Gaur Bahadur Bishwakarma	CPN
15	Saptari	सप्तरी	Rudraprasad Pandit	Shiv Narayan Shah	Nepali Congress
16	Siraha	सिरहा	Bhagirath Pandey	Dinesh Kumar Mahato	PSP-N
17	Dhanusa	धनुषा	Dilip Kumar Chapagai	Ramnandan Mandal	Nepali Congress
18	Mahottari	महोत्तरी	शिवराम गेलाल	Suman Kumar Lal Karn	LSP-N
19	Sarlahi	सर्लाही	Gopal Kumar Adhikari	Kaushal Kishor Singh	Nepali Congress
20	Sindhuli	सिन्धुली					-
21	Ramechhap	रामेछाप	Shobhakhar Regmi				-
22	Dolakha	दोलखा	Laxman Bikram Thapa
23	Sindhupalchok	सिन्धुपाल्चोक
24	Kavrepalanchowk	काभ्रेपलाञ्चोक	Shiv Prasad Shimkhada	Dip Kumar Gautam	CPN
25	Lalitpur	ललितपुर	Mahadeb Pantha		Nepali Congress
26	Bhaktapur	भक्तपुर	रोशनी कुमारी श्रेष्ठ
27	Kathmandu	काठमाडौं	Kedarnath Sharma
28	Nuwakot	नुवाकोट	Birendra Kumar Yadav
29	Rasuwa	रसुवा
30	Dhading	धादिङ	Shyam Prasad Bhandari
31	Makwanpur	मकवानपुर	Tirtharaj Chiluwal
32	Rautahat	रौतहट	Basu Dev Ghimire	Ram Ayodhya Yadav	Nepali Congress
33	Bara	बारा	Vijay Narayan Manandhar	Narendra Kumar Sah	CPN
34	Parsa	पर्सा	Vinod Prakash Singh	Niranjan Sah Sonar	PSP-N
35	Chitwan	चितवन	Narayan Prasad Bhatt		Nepali Congress
36	Gorkha	गोरखा	Shri Jitendra Basnet
37	Lamjung	लमजुङ	Yuvaraj Mainali
38	Tanahun	तनहुँ	Bharat Kumar Sharma
39	Syangja	स्याङ्जा	Shri Mahesh Aacharya
40	Kaski	कास्की	Taranath Adhikari
41	Manang	मनाङ	Hariprasad Panta
42	Mustang	मुस्ताङ	Ramchandra Tiwari
43	Myagdi	म्याग्दी	Krishnaprasad Adhikari
44	Parbat	पर्वत	Rajesh Panthi
45	Baglung	बागलुङ
46	Gulmi	गुल्मी	Shri Gopal Prasad Aryal
47	Palpa	पाल्पा	Bishnu Prasad Dhakal
48	Nawalpur	नवलपुर	Udaya Bahadur Rana Magar
49	Parasi	परासी
50	Rupandehi	रुपन्देही	Hariprasad Mainali
51	Kapilvastu	कपिलवस्तु	Madan Bhujel
52	Arghakhanchi	अर्घाखाँची	BijayRaj Paudel
53	Pyuthan	प्युठान	Dr. Krishna Bahadur Ghimire
54	Rolpa	रोल्पा	Ganj Bahadur MC
55	Eastern Rukum	पूर्वी रुकुम	Bhupendra Sapkota
56	Western Rukum	पश्चिमी रुकुम	Banshi Kumar Aacharya
57	Salyan	सल्यान	Paramananda Ghimire
58	Dang	दाङ	Shri Gajendra Bahadur Shrestha
59	Banke	बाँके	Ramesh Kumar KC
60	Bardiya	बर्दिया	Shri PremLal Lamichhane
61	Surkhet	सुर्खेत	Sitaram Karki
62	Dailekh	दैलेख	Nabaraj Jaisi
63	Jajarkot	जाजरकोट	Pushparaj Shahi
64	Dolpa	डोल्पा	Bhupendra Thapa
65	Jumla	जुम्ला	Bishnu Paudel
66	Kalikot	कालिकोट	Chandranath Gautam
67	Mugu	मुगु	Shri Umakanta Adhikari
68	Humla	हुम्ला		Shiv Raj Sharma	CPN
69	Bajura	बाजुरा	Luk Bahadur Chetri
70	Bajhang	बझाङ	Prem Singh Kunwar
71	Achham	अछाम	Kishor Kumar Chaudhari
72	Doti	डोटी	Surya Bahadur Khatri
73	Kailali	कैलाली	Gobind Prasad Rijal		Nepali Congress
74	Kanchanpur	कञ्चनपुर	Ram Prasad Pandey
75	Dadeldhura	डडेल्धुरा	Janakraj Bhatt
76	Baitadi	बैतडी	Siddha Raj Joshi
77	Darchula	दार्चुला	Janardan Gautam