Four former chairs of Nepal Bar Association have taken serious exception to Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli’s recent remarks denigrating Krishna Prasad Bhandari, the country’s senior most advocate and a former Bar chair.

Bhandari had recently argued against Prime Minister Oli’s move of dissolving the House of Representatives, a case that is being heard by the Constitutional Bench of the Supreme Court.

On Friday, Oli attacked Bhandari at a public gathering, referring to him as a “grandpa lawyer” and his presence at the hearing a “drama”.

Slandering the country’s most senior legal professional is a “shameful attack on the entire legal profession”, the former Bar chairpersons said in a statement.

Through the statement, the four former Bar chairs Harihar Dahal, Shambhu Thapa, Prem Bahadur Khadka and Sher Bahadur KC have urged all law practitioners to stand up against the attack on their profession and demanded that Oli apologise.

They have also said that Oli’s remarks were tantamount to contempt of court, because he was speaking on a sub judice case.

The former Bar chairs have also criticised Prime Minister Oli for his repeated slurs on the judiciary and legal professionals.

Earlier, Oli had said that the lawyers arguing against the House dissolution move at the Supreme Court didn’t know what they were doing and that they were “howling like jackals”.

“With such public remarks the prime minister has attacked the legal profession which is protected by the constitution. Such attacks cannot be tolerated,” the former Bar chairs said in the statement.