LI NETWORK
The Supreme Court summoned Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli face-to-face within 7 days along with a penned response to the question of why he shouldn’t be given punishment for contempt of court.
The Supreme Court’s assistant spokesperson, Mr. Devendra Dhakal said that “The Supreme Court has summoned the prime minister to present his written response.”
The order was issued by the single bench of Justice Manoj Kumar Sharma on the 28th after overseeing two court cases of contempt against PM Oli.
This is most likely the first that PM Oli was summoned by the Supreme Court on a court contempt case.
On the 26th of January, two court contempt cases were filed at the Top Court — one by Sr. Adv. Kumar Sharma Acharya and the second by Adv. Kanchan Krishana Neupane.
Both were filed against the prime minister for making unfavourable comments against judicial practitioners as well as trying to persuade and influence the court.
On the 22nd of January, the Prime Minister defended the dissolution move on his House during the address of his cadres.
And while doing so, he stated that the legal practitioners and counselors were arguing ad nauseum upon the dissolution of the House despite the lack of provision in the Constitution for allowance on restoring the House.
Oli also took a jibe on the previous Nepal Bar Association chair and sr. advocate, Mr. Krishna Prasad Bhandari who’s 94 years old, by stating that the claimants were also causing trouble to the “grandfather” lawyer.
“The same bench has also summoned former Speaker Daman Nath Dhungana to present at the court in person with a written response,” Mr. Dhakal informed the press.
After overseeing another contempt of court petition filed against Mr. Dhungana by lawyer Rajaram Ghimire, Justice Sharma also summoned the former speaker.
In the petition filed by Mr. Ghimire, he made the argument that the statements made by the former Speaker on the lines of how Supreme Court Justices when speaking upon a public forum can easily be targeted if they didn’t give consideration to the sentiment of the people while they deliver justice, were in contempt of court.
On the 28th, the court had summoned the previous four chief justices — Mr. Min Bahadur Rayamajhi, Mr. Anup Raj Sharma, Mr. Kalyan Shrestha, and Mr. Sushila Karki, as well in person with penned responses within a period of 7 days.
On January 8th, these previous chief justices had given a statement stating that the dissolution of House can be considered unconstitutional which as per two petitioners, Mr. Lochan Bhattarai and Mr. Dhanjit Basnet, could easily influence the current ongoing hearing on the same subject and led to contempt of court.