KATHMANDU: Uncertainty has emerged over the election result in Dhanusha-1 after the Election Commission Nepal withheld the official declaration of the winner following the disqualification of a candidate from the Rastriya Swatantra Party (RSP).
On March 2, the Election Commission annulled the candidacy of RSP nominee Kishori Sah after confirming that his name was listed on the blacklist of the Credit Information Bureau Nepal, which records defaulters of banks and financial institutions.
The decision came just days before the election, leaving the RSP at a disadvantage at a time when the party was gaining momentum nationwide following campaign efforts led by leaders such as Balen Shah and Rabi Lamichhane.
A total of 42 candidates were in the race in Dhanusha-1, including Ramchandra Mandal of the CPN-UML, Rampaltan Sah of the Nepali Congress, and Matrika Prasad Yadav of the Nepali Communist Party.
Preliminary vote counts show that Yadav secured the highest number of valid votes and appears to have won the seat. However, the Election Commission has yet to formally declare him the winner or issue a certificate.
The Nepali Communist Party has objected to the delay. Party leaders argue that the vote counting was conducted on March 5 in the presence of representatives from all candidates and that the result clearly shows Yadav’s victory.
According to party officials, the commission’s decision to withhold the result is inconsistent with established election procedures, particularly when the candidacy of Kishori Sah had already been legally annulled.
Yadav has also accused the commission of applying double standards and demanded that the official result be published without further delay.
Officials at the Election Commission say the result has been withheld because a petition challenging the cancellation of Sah’s candidacy is currently under consideration at the Supreme Court of Nepal.
The commission had earlier directed the election office not to include votes cast under the RSP’s bell symbol in the official tally and to maintain a separate record of those ballots.
Despite Sah’s disqualification, the bell symbol reportedly received the highest number of votes during counting. Preliminary figures suggest the symbol received 21,775 votes, significantly more than those received by other candidates.
According to publicly available vote counts, Matrika Prasad Yadav secured 10,428 votes, while Congress candidate Rampaltan Sah received 9,485 votes and UML candidate Ramchandra Mandal obtained 9,220 votes.
Sah filed a writ petition at the Supreme Court on Falgun 19 challenging the Election Commission’s decision to cancel his candidacy. The case has been scheduled for hearing on Monday before a single bench of Justice Nripdhwaj Niraula.
The case has been listed as the fourth item on the court’s daily hearing schedule. Sah has demanded that his candidacy be reinstated and that the commission’s decision be overturned.
Reports indicate that Sah had been listed on the financial blacklist on multiple occasions. Complaints regarding his status had previously been filed with the Election Commission after the RSP nominated him as a candidate.
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