ASSEMBLY POLL '98
COMMENTARY
SPECIALS
INTERVIEWS
CAPITAL BUZZ
REDIFF POLL
DEAR REDIFF
THE STATES
YEH HAI INDIA!
ELECTIONS '98
ARCHIVES

PM makes Khurana defer statement on quitting

Former Union minister Madan Lal Khurana has decided to defer the personal statement which was to be made by him today in the Lok Sabha following a request by Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee.

Sources said that the request on behalf of the prime minister was made by Union Parliamentary Affairs Minister P R Kumaramangalam who met Khurana last evening.

Thereafter Khurana along with Kumaramangalam went to Speaker G M C Balayogi and requested him to postpone the date for making the statement explaining the reasons for his resignation from the Union council of ministers.

The sources said that about 38 MPs -- 37 from the Lok Sabha and one from the Rajya Sabha -- had sent a joint letter to the prime minister, seeking his intervention to resolve the Khurana issue. The MPs pointed out that Khurana was a senior party leader and that they supported the issues raised by him.

They also urged the prime minister to talk to Khurana and resolve the issue. They informed that they had already appealed to Khurana not to make any statement on the day when the government was to get the resolution on Bihar passed in the Lok Sabha. His step might create some problem for the government.

Acceding to their request, the prime minister is understood to have sent Kumaramangalam to talk to Khurana on his behalf.

Earlier yesterday, a number of party MPs virtually gheraoed Khurana as soon as he entered the Parliament House and urged him to postpone the statement.

UNI

Tell us what you think of this report