KATHMANDU: Nepal’s urban population has reached 66.08 percent.

According to the preliminary data released by the Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS) on Wednesday, the urban population of Nepal has reached 66.08 percent  when the rural population has shrunk to 33.92 percent.

This is a massive alarming shift from village to towns on the basis of the percentage of population. There were 17.07 percent people living in urban areas ten years before.

The sudden growth of the percentage of the city dwellers is actually the result of the restructuring of the former rural areas as and into the urban areas.

Nepal which had 58 municipalities has got 293 areas declared as municipalities now.The population of 293 municipalities has been counted as urban and the population of 460 rural municipalities has been included in the list of rural dwellers.

The national census of 2011 had mentioned the rural population as 82.93 percent.

According to the department, the five most populous rural municipalities are Baijnath, Raptisonari and Khajura of Banke district, Mayadevi Rural Municipalities of Rupandehi and Kapilvastu district.

Similarly, Narpa Bhumi of Manang district, Lo-Ghekar Damodarkund of Mustang district, Manang Ngisyang and Naso villages of Manang district are among the five villages with the lowest population.

The highest population is 70,315 in Baijnath rural municipality of Banke district and the lowest population is 442 people in Norfabhumi rural municipality of Manang district.

There are 46 rural municipalities with a population of less than 10,000 and 15 rural municipalities with a population of more than 50,000.

Kathmandu, Pokhara, Bharatpur, Lalitpur and Birgunj are the five most populous municipalities among the urban areas. Similarly, Thulibheri and Tripurasundari of Dolpa, Madi of Sankhuwasabha district, Laligurans of Tehrathum district and Jiri municipality of Dolakha district are among the five least populated municipalities.

According to CBS, Kathmandu Metropolitan City has the highest population of 865,906 and Thulivheri Municipality has the lowest population of 10,187. There are 14 municipalities with a population of less than 20,000 and 39 municipalities with a population of more than 100,000.