Kathmandu, March 27

The Supreme Court today quashed its chief registrar’s decision to refuse to register a case against the swearing-in of President Bidhya Devi Bhandari by former chief justice Gopal Prasad Parajuli.

Advocate Narayan Kharel and others had sought to file a case at SC seeking nullification of President Bhandari’s swearing-in, arguing that the day former CJ Parajuli administered the oath of office and secrecy to the president, the Judicial Council had written a letter to the concerned bodies informing them that Parajuli had reached his retirement age on August 5 last year and hence the swearing in was unconstitutional, said SC’s Communication Expert Kishor Paudel.

A single bench of Justice Ishwar Prasad Khatiwada passed the order today saying that the petitioner had raised an important legal issue which should not be prevented from being heard by the court. This means that the SC administration will now have to register Kharel’s petition.

The bench quashed the chief registrar’s refusal order, saying it was not based on reasonable and adequate grounds.