KATHMANDU, DECEMBER 23 The Supreme Court today began hearing petitions challenging Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli’s sudden decision to dissolve the House of Representatives, a move denounced by his opponents as unconstitutional. All the 12 petitions challenging the dissolution of the lower House were heard by the single bench of Chief Justice Cholendra Shumsher JB Rana and was referred to the constitutional bench. The constitutional bench that hears cases involving interpretation of constitutional provisions conducts its hearing on Wednesdays and Fridays. The petitions that were referred to the constitutional bench will be heard on Friday. The constitutional bench is headed by Chief Justice Rana and includes justices Deepak Kumar Karki, Meera Khadka, Bishwambhar Shrestha, and Hari Krishna Karki. Advocate Govinda Bandi, who represented four NCP lawmakers of the dissolved House, argued before the bench that the case should be referred to a larger bench and not the five-member constitutional bench. He said the two previous House dissolution cases were heard by an 11-member bench of the Supreme Court. Senior Advocate Shambhu Thapa argued that the PM’s recommendations to dissolve HoR could have been justified had he recommended dissolution of HoR after failing to get any major policy passed in the HoR. When policies and programmes tabled by the Girija Prasad Koirala-led government in the HoR failed, Koirala sought to go to the polls and the court validated his decision. In this case, Oli has neither presented any policy in the Parliament, nor has any of his policy decisions failed in the HoR, Thapa argued. He added that he should let someone else from his party with majority support become the PM. By going to the polls, Oli is not only risking his own political future, but also that of the lawmakers who got elected for a five-year term in 2017, added Thapa. The court did not issue an interim order as demanded by the petitioners.