MURREE: The Lahore High Court`s Rawalpindi bench on Thursday set aside the decision of the Delimitation Authority to merge Union Council Santh Saroola into Malot Sattiyan of Tehsil Kotli and UC Bunn into Charehan and UC Nambal into Murree City.

Justice Mehmood Ahmad Bhatti issued the ruling in the light of a decision of the same court on October 6.

A number of petitioners through Raja Shafgat Abbasi had challenged the decision to merge UC Santh Saroola into Malot of Kotli Sattiyan Town and UC Bunn into UC Charehan and Nambal into Murree city of Murree Town.

The court set aside the decision and restored the previous status of the UCs.In the October 6 decision, the court had declared the delimitation process null and void, adding proper legal process was not adopted in the delimitation.

The court ordered the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) to issue a new schedule for the UCs as the last date for the submission of nomination papers was October 7.

However, the ECP did not issue a new schedule but accepted the nomination papers of a large number of candidates for the forthcoming local government elections.

The EC intends to file an appeal with the Supreme Court against the LHC decision but unless the apex court accepts the appeal the decision of LHC is final, said Shafgat Abbasi,the counselforthe petitioners.

He said the petitioners would file a contempt petition with the court against the ECP for not implementing the order to issue a new schedule.

When this correspondent contacted Returning Of ficer Murree Tahir Farooq and asked him why he had accepted the nomination papers af ter the LHC ruling, he said ROs were not the party in the case and were bound to follow the orders of the E CP. He said the ECP had not issued him any fresh orders so he was duty bound to follow the schedule given to him earlier.

Despite repeated attempts, District Election Commissioner Rawalpindi Nadeem Zubair could not be contacted for comments.Correspondent