Union Minister of State for Finance Gingee N Ramachandran is likely to resign in the wake of the arrest of his personal assistant for allegedly accepting bribe for fixing an official's transfer.
Highly placed sources said the minister is expected to put in his papers shortly after it was considered at the highest levels that his continuance in the government had become untenable in the wake of CBI action against the PA and the arrest of the official who sought his help in getting the transfer and the tracing of links to a Chennai-based chartered accountant, who acted as a conduit.
Earlier in the day, Ramachandran while speaking to reporters on his return from Chennai said that he has no intention to resign from his post as his "conscience was clear".
The Central Bureau of Investigation on Thursday arrested Perumal Swamy alias Babu for allegedly accepting a bribe of Rs 400,000 from a revenue official.
CBI sources said a crack team raided a place where Swamy was accepting the bribe from IRS official Anurag Vardhan.
Vardhan had approached Swamy through Krishnamurthy, a middleman based in Chennai, for a posting in Mumbai.
The deal was struck at Rs 400,000 and orders for Vardhan's transfer to Mumbai were issued on Wednesday evening.
In subsequent searches conducted at Swamy's residence, the CBI claimed to have recovered some incriminating documents.
Searches in Chennai led to a recovery of Rs 65 lakh (Rs 6.5 million) in cash and cheques amounting to Rs 57 lakh (Rs 5.7 million).