Kathmandu, June 5
The Supreme Court on Monday told the Election Commission not to implement its decision to redo voting in ward 19 of Bharatpur Metropolitan City in Chitwan district till June 11*.
A single bench of Justice Cholendra Shamsher Rana issued the order responding to a writ filed yesterday.
Meanwhile, the court has summoned both plaintiffs and defendants to the next hearing scheduled for June 11. The hearing would would decide whether to issue an interim order as demanded by the writ petitioners.
The CPN-UML ward member candidate Gunjaman BK and advocate Tulsiram Pandey, who happens to be a voter from the same ward, had filed the writ demanding that the Commission’s decision be annulled and the halted counting be resumed by declaring torn 90 ballot papers as invalid.
Senior advocate Shambhu Thapa and advocates Tikaram Bhattarai and Govinda Bandi among others had defended the case on behalf of the plaintiffs.
The Election Commission on Saturday had decided to redo the poll in Bharatpur after some Maoist cadres reportedly torn ballot papers while the vote counting was underway last week.
The ruling Nepali Congress and the CPN-Maoist Centre, which had formed an election alliance, had demanded the revoting whereas the main opposition UML was in favour of resuming the vote counting delcaring the torn ballot papers invalid.
The NC-MC candidate Renu Dahal was lagging behind UML’s Devi Gyawali by few hundred votes in the mayoral race while the counting was halted after the incident.
*Corrected
