Governor yet to accept resignations of 7 UP ministers

Lucknow, Feb 20 (UNI) Uttar Pradesh governor T V Rajeswar is yet to accept the resignations of seven ministers of the Mulayam Singh Yadav government, who were disqualified as MLAs by the Supreme Court on February 14.

Sources said the issue was pending with the governor. The ministers had resigned in wake of the SC ruling disqualifying them with effect from August 27, 2003.

The state legislative assembly had yesterday issued notification disqualifying 13 MLAs with retrospective effect from August 27, 2003 following an apex court judgement. The seven ministers were a part of the 13 MLA group disqualified by the SC.

Assembly speaker Mata Prasad Pandey said he was also considering the fate of the remaining 24 MLAs of the total 37 Loktantrik Bahujan Dal (LBD) legislators, who had left BSP and had later merged with SP, enabling Mulayam Singh Yadav form an alternative government in UP in August, 2003.

Meanwhile, Principal Secretary (Asembly) A N Mittal said today the assembly secretariat has received te certified copy of the SC judgement. ''Since the Speaker is away, any decision on the fate of the remaining 24 MLAs would be taken later.'' Incidentally, the Governor had sought details on the future of the 24 MLAs from the Speaker yesterday.

Howevewr the Speaker denied receiving any letter from the governor containing queries about the status of LBD MLAs in UP, but said the recent crisis was not constitutional, but a political one.

The MLAs, who have been disqualified are Rajendra Singh Rana, Shailendra Yadav, Yogesh Pratap Singh, Rajendra Singh Chohan, Jai Prakash Yadav, Jaiveer Singh, Surendra Vikram Singh, Virendra Singh Bundela, Rajpal Tyagi, Kazim Ali Khan, Dinesh Singh and Brijendra Pratap Singh.

Of these, seven -- Rajendra Singh Rana, Shailendra Yadav, Yogesh Pratap Singh, Jai Prakash Yadav, Virendra Singh Bundela, Rajpal Tyagi and Dinesh Singh -- had tendered their resignation on Thursday night.

Jaiveer Singh and Surendra Vikram Singh had already been disqualified by the Speaker on June 10, 2006, but the order was stayed by the SC.

UNI