A legal battle which could change the result of a contested Bradford Council election result in May is expected to begin in the High Court on Wednesday.

Tory candidate Jamshed Khan, who came second in the poll in the Little Horton ward, believes he lost out because of a simple counting error.

Mr Khan of Russell Street, Bradford, claims he won at least 1,007 postal votes and on election day at least 800 people voted for him in polling stations.

The result announced on the night of the poll was that 3,745 votes were cast with a turn out of 37 per cent. Mr Khan polled 1,297 votes against the 1,903 for his Labour rival Taj Mubarik Salam.

Mr Khan has now presented a petition to the High Court under the Representation of the People Act claiming the result was flawed.

In the petition he says the result was "mistaken" and "did not reflect the true result or number of votes cast for the individual candidates."

He claims there were "procedural errors" in the count and a box of postal votes was opened when neither he nor his electoral agent were present.

He claims he requested a recount on the night of the poll but was refused by the Returning Officer's representative.

In the petition Mr Khan claims he can "prove that he received substantially more than the 1,279 votes declared."

The petition adds: "In short there was a simple counting error in the allocation of votes to particular candidates."

When the case appeared on July 10 before Mr Justice Jackson in the High Court in London all sides agreed the matter should be adjourned for 14 days to allow Mr Khan to put forward evidence in support of his claims.

When the case returns to court, a judge will be asked to decide whether there should be an official recount which would normally take place before a senior High Court official.