KATHMANDU: The Supreme Court on Tuesday has asked the Election Commission to submit original decision to conduct re-polling in Ward 19 of Bharatpur Metropolitian City.

A joint bench of Acting Chief Justice Gopal Prasad Parajuli and Justice Hari Krishna Karki made the decision to this effect today.

Challenging the June 3  EC decision to conduct re-polling in Ward 19 of Bharatpur Metropolitian City, Gunja Man BK, a ward member candidate for Bharatpur -19 and advocate Tulasi Pandey had moved the apex court on June 4.

On June 3, 2017 the Election Commission had ordered re-polling in ward 19 of Bharatpur after CPN Maosit Centre representatives had allegedly torn as many as 90 ballot papers with votes  on May 28, 2017 while the counting of votes was underway. This incident has halted the vote count in Bharatpur.

The EC had reasoned that the vote counting centre was illegitimately taken under control and the decision to re-polling was taken in accordance with the Clause 50 (4) of the Local Level Election Act 2017.

However, the main opposition CPN-UML, whose mayoral candidate was also leading in the vote count, had also objected to the EC decision and obstructed the Legislature-Parliament proceedings, which ended after the SC stayed the EC decision on June 5.