He has been given a week to handover the works and vacate office on October 20

LG: Langthel gup, Lham Dorji was relieved from the gup’s position on October 9 after he was convicted to two months imprisonment for bribing an engineer, Tashi Penjor and Chasikhar construction company proprietor, Thinley Jamtsho in the Shatong goenpa construction in Dagana.

Langthel gup has been asked to vacate office as per the local government (LG) Act. Section 31 of the LG Act states that a member of a local government shall be removed if convicted for a criminal offence and sentenced to imprisonment.

The Supreme Court also recently notified that an elected member should go on mandatory resignation upon conviction to imprisonment as pronounced in the election Act and the Constitution.

“The committee decided to ask the gup to resign as per the LG act,” DT chairperson, Tashi Pendhen said. “A copy each of the meeting resoultion has also been forwarded to Department of Local Government (DLG) and the Election Commission of Bhutan (ECB).”

Trongsa dzongkhag administration took the decision after receiving a letter from the DLG on October 7. The letter has notified dzongkhag to take action against the convicted gup based on the LG Act.

On October 9, DT led by its chairperson with gups and mangmis from other gewogs formed a committee to act on Langthel gup’s case.

The gup has been given until October 19 to handover all documents to the mangmi. The gup resigns officially on October 20.

“The gup has been given a week starting October 9 to handover the documents, budgets, plans and construction sites to the mangmi who will now officiate as gup until the bye-election,” Tashi Pendhen said.

Dzongkhag electoral officer, Needup said the bye-election would be held in 30 days from the date of vacancy as per the election Act.

“Bye-election for filing any vacancy to parliament shall be held within a period of 90 days and to local governments shall be held within the period of 30 days, from the date of the occurrence of the vacancy,” the election Act states.

Tempa Wangdi, Zhemgang