Kathmandu, Feb. 24 -- In the two months since Prime Minister K P Olidissolved the Lower House of Parliament,massive rallies were held across the country. Oli and his arch rival in the party, Pushpa Kamal Dahal, competed to have bigger and more expensive rallies. This my-crowd-is-bigger-than-yours contest was intended to influence the Supreme Court as it deliberated on the constitutionality of the House dissolution.

The enormous amount of money spent, from the state treasury by the Oli faction and from party coffers by the other, went to waste. In the end, the 5-justice Constitutional Bench decided on the basis of legal merit, not on the size of the crowds.

Each faction accused the other of "setting" the Supreme Court and the Election Co...