The Supreme Court has issued an interim order directing the Election Commission to ensure that political parties include people with disabilities in their proportional representation (PR) closed lists for the House of Representatives elections.

A joint bench of justices Hari Prasad Phuyal and Tek Prasad Dhungana issued the order on Friday in response to a writ petition filed by Madhav Prasad Chamlagain and others.

In its order, the apex court said that if any political party has failed to include candidates with disabilities in its closed list, the commission must instruct the concerned party to correct the list and include such candidates before resubmission.

The bench noted that Article 84(3) of the constitution requires political parties to ensure representation of people with disabilities while submitting the list of candidates under the proportional representation system.

It also cited Section 28(6) of the House of Representatives Election Act, 2017, which mandates representation of candidates from backward regions and people with disabilities in the closed list.

The petitioners argued that although the ordinance amending the election law included Dalits, indigenous nationalities, Khas Arya, Madheshi, Tharu and Muslim communities under the criteria of inclusion, it ignored people with disabilities, who account for 2.2 percent of the population according to the 2021 national census. They claimed this omission violated the constitution, existing law and international conventions.

The court also referred to its earlier order issued on January 11, 2024, in a separate writ petition, which had directed the authorities to make necessary arrangements to ensure representation of people with disabilities in future elections.

Considering the submissions and the legal provisions, the bench said that failure to include people with disabilities in the closed lists could cause irreparable harm. It ordered the Election Commission to scrutinise the lists submitted by all political parties under Section 28(10) of the election law and ensure compliance with the constitution, law and court orders.

According to Kul Bahadur GC, assistant spokesperson for the Election Commission, political parties can correct their submitted lists from January 5 to 11. The commission will examine the corrected lists from January 12 to 17 before publishing the final lists on February 3.