Six ministers resign in UP

Lucknow, Feb 15 (UNI) Six Uttar Pradesh ministers today resigned from the Samajwadi Party-led government after being disqualified as MLAs by the Supreme Court yesterday.

Chief Minister Mulayam Singh Yadav handed over their resignation letters to governor T V Rajeswar here this evening.

Talking to mediapersons outside Raj Bhawan, Mr Yadav said the Ministers resigned on moral grounds following the verdict. The remaining one Minister will resign later, as he is out of town.

However, the CM denied that minister-rank Corporation chairmen had resigned.

The six Ministers, who put in their papers are, Minister of state for women welfare and culture Rajendra Singh Rana, minister of state for social welfare Shailendra Yadav, minister of state for agriculture education Yogesh Pratap Singh, minister of state for national integration Virendra Singh Bundela, minister of state for fisheries Dinesh Singh and rural development minister Rajpal Tyagi.

Asked if he was summoned by the Governor, the CM replied it is all the same if he was summoned or he came to meet the governor. He was closeted with the governor for more than 30 minutes and discussed in detail the verdict.

Mr Yadav, however, refused to comment on whether all the 37 Loktrantrik Bahujan Dal (LBD) MLA were disqualified as claimed by the BSP and other opposition parties. ''I can only say SC has disqualified 13 MLAs,'' he reiterated.

The Chief Minister, refusing to step down on moral grounds, maintained his government still enjoyed full majority in the Assembly and if the opposition wants, then Samajwadi Party can again seek a trust vote on floor of the house on February 26, the next sitting.

The 13 disqualified MLAs are Rajendra Singh Rana, Virendra Singh Bundela, Jaiveer Singh, Yogesh Pratap Singh, Shailendra Yadav, Jai Prakash Yadav, Brijendra Pratap Singh, Rajendra Singh Chauhan, Rajpal Tyagi, Surendra Vikram Singh, Kazim Ali Khan, Dinesh Singh and Qutub-ud-din Ansari.

Jaiveer Singh and Surendra Vikram Singh were disqualified by the speaker on June 10, as they had rejoined BSP after Allahabad High Court decision on February 28, 2006. But the SC had earlier stayed their disqualification along with three other members.

Among the disqualified MLAs Rajendra Singh Rana, Yogesh Pratap Singh, Jai Prakash Yadav, Rajpal Tyagi, Virendra Singh Bundela and Dinesh Singh and Shailendra Singh are ministers in the Mulayam ministry, while rest are chairperson of different UP corporations.

Yesterday, the CM had termed the disqualified MLAs as 'martyrs' and said there was no question of their resignation from the post of ministers or as chairmen of different corporations.

A five-member SC Constitution Bench in its unanimous verdict, held the 13 MLAs of the breakaway group, who had defected on August 27, 2003 were guilty of defection and disqualified them as MLAs.

The apex court held the split in political parties has to be prima facie demonstrated and claims of a split do not matter.

UNI