Kathmandu, Feb 15: The Supreme Court has issued an interim order to prevent Mayor of Kathmandu Metropolitan City, Balendra Shah, from immediately dismissing the Election Commission due to his failure to provide election expenditure details.

Mayor Shah, who had filed a writ petition against the Election Commission’s decision to impose a fine of Rs. 1,230,624 on him and 123,624 other individuals for failing to provide election expenditure details, was contesting the decision.

Chief Justice Hari Krishna Karki, along with Justices Vishwambar Shrestha, Anandamohan Bhattarai, Anil Kumar Sinha, and Prakash Man Singh Raut, sitting on the Constitutional Bench, issued the order.

In December of last year, the Election Commission had given the candidates who failed to provide election expenditure details within 30 days of the completion of the election a six-month deadline to submit the details, failing which they would be disqualified from running for office or removed if they had already been elected. The Election Commission had fined Mayor Shah Rs. 550,000 for failing to comply.