The Election Commission (EC) has directed officials to delay the announcement of the final result in Dhanusha-1 after disqualifying the Rastriya Swatantra Party (RSP) candidate just days before the election.

The commission had scrapped the candidacy of RSP nominee Kishori Sah Kamal two days before polling citing he was blacklisted for banking offences.

According to records provided to the commission, Sah had been blacklisted on October 17, 2022, and December 22, 2023.

As the disqualification came only 48 hours before voting, ballot papers could not be reprinted. As a result, voters cast ballots that still included the party’s ‘Bell’ symbol.

Initially, the Office of the Returning Officer decided that votes cast for the ‘Bell’ symbol would be treated as invalid. However, after protests by RSP leaders and cadres, the electoral authority instructed officials to count those votes but keep the figures confidential.

Manoj Baral, the returning officer for Dhanusha-1, said the votes for the ‘Bell’ symbol had been counted but not publicly disclosed. “The votes have been recorded privately and not shared with anyone,” he said, adding that any numbers circulating publicly are only estimates.

Chief District Officer Prem Prasad Luitel said some people were attempting to estimate the number of votes cast for the ‘Bell’ symbol by subtracting the valid votes of other candidates and invalid ballots from the total turnout. Out of 126,040 registered voters in the constituency, 78,463 cast their ballots.

As of 7 pm on Sunday, only seven ballot boxes from Sabaila area remained to be counted. Ram Paltan Sah of the Nepali Congress was leading the vote count, followed by Matrika Yadav of the Nepali Communist Party and Ramchandra Mandal of the CPN-UML.

EC sent another directive on Sunday instructing the returning officer not to declare the final result or issue a certificate of election until the court delivers its verdict on the case challenging Sah’s disqualification.