Normal life was paralysed across Nepal on Thursday during a nation-wide general strike called by the Nepal Communist Party’s splinter faction-led by Pushpa Kamal Dahal, alias Prachanda, to oppose Prime Minister K.P. Sharma Oli government’s appointment of office bearers and members of various constitutional bodies.

Major markets, educational institutions, offices and factories were shut down while transport services were disrupted during the strike.

The government had mobilised at least 5,000 security personnel in Kathmandu valley to prevent any untoward incident. Only few motorbikes were seen moving around the capital city since morning.

Police arrested 157 cadres of the Prachanda-led faction for enforcing the strike.

The NCP’s central committee members, Ashta Laxmi Shakya, Himal Sharma and Amrita Thapa, were among those arrested. They vandalised at least three vehicles in Kathmandu for defying the strike. “Eighty people have been arrested from the Kathmandu Valley, while the remaining 77 were arrested from outside the Valley,” senior superintendent of police Basanta Kunwar said.