Okhaldhunga Districtओखलढुङ्गा जिल्ला

Okhaldhunga is a 1,074 km² hill district at the western edge of Koshi Province, its terrain stepping from about 300 m in the river valleys to 4,000 m on the high ridges, with just over half the land in the subtropical belt. It is one of the province's smaller and quieter districts: eight local levels, of which only the headquarters unit — Siddhicharan Municipality, around Okhaldhunga bazaar — is urban, the other seven being rural municipalities.

The district's most celebrated export is literary. Okhaldhunga is the birthplace of Siddhicharan Shrestha (1912–1992), honoured as 'Yug Kavi', the poet of the era, whose verse about his home hills is among the best-known in Nepali literature — and whose name the headquarters municipality now bears. The population is a typical eastern-hill mix of Rai (21%), Chhetri (11.6%) and Magar (10.2%) communities, with Nepali the first language of about half the district.

Okhaldhunga's social indicators trail its tea-growing eastern neighbours — its 73.9% literacy rate is the lowest in Koshi Province — and its farm-based economy continues to lose people to migration, the census count slipping from 147,984 in 2011 to 139,552 in 2021 (−0.56% a year).