NAC to be out of OoP; Sonia's return as NAC head not known:Cong

New Delhi, May 15 (UNI) The Congress today confirmed that the National Advisory Council (NAC), constituted to monitor the implementation of the UPA government's National Common Minimum Programme (NCMP), was being taken out of the purview of disqualification under the office-of-profit law.

AICC spokesman Rajiv Shukla, however, expressed ignorance about the possibility of party President and UPA Chairperson Sonia Gandhi returning to head the NAC.

Replying to questions on NAC being made an exempted office under the office-of-profit law and Ms Gandhi staging a comeback, he said ''Yes, the first part of the question is right. But I don't know anything about the second part.'' Ms Gandhi had quit the NAC and as an MP in the wake of a complaint to President A P J Abdul Kalam seeking her disqualification as a Lok Sabha member for holding the post of NAC Chairpersonship, on the lines of the unseating of Samajwadi Party Rajya Sabha member, Ms Jaya Bachchan.

Ms Gandhi has since been re-elected from the Rae Bareli Lok Sabha constitutuency in a bypoll, necessitated by her resignation.

UNI SN VD HT1810