CAIRO, Apr 18 (Aswat Masriya) – Egypt’s Supreme Administrative Court referred on Saturday a lawsuit filed to dissolve the Salafist al-Nour Party back to the administrative court, reported the state agency MENA.

The supreme court said it cannot look into the lawsuit, tasking the administrative court with issuing its ruling in the case, MENA reported.

The plaintiffs had argued that the party violates Egypt’s constitution, which bans the existence of political parties with a religious reference.

Nour Party was established by a group of ultra-conservative Muslims shortly after the January 2011 uprising which toppled the regime of former President Hosni Mubarak.

It garnered 20 percent of the seats in the 2012 parliamentary elections, ranking the second biggest Islamist party in Egypt after the Muslim Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice Party (FJP), before the FJP was dissolved by a court order in August 2014. 

Nour Party, which has supported the military ouster of Islamist President Mohamed Mursi in July 2013 following mass protests against his rule, is preparing to compete in the coming parliamentary elections.