Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa on Thursday demanded the resignation of Home Minister P Chidambaram or his removal -- in the wake of the Madras high court rejecting his plea over an election petition -- and said his continuation would be a "blot on democracy".
Chidambaram, who is facing charges of poll irregularities, should resign forthwith and if he failed to do so, the prime minister should drop him from the Cabinet, she said.
Referring to the court observation that Chidambaram should face the case, Jayalalithaa said in this context, "Chidambaram remaining as home minister will be a blot on Indian democracy".
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'Chidambaram won the election in a fraudulent manner'
"AIADMK's stand on the issue is that Chidambaram won the election in a fraudulent manner," the chief minister said in a statement.
She was reacting to the Madurai bench of the high court declining to dismiss a petition challenging his election to the Lok Sabha in 2009.
The AIADMK supremo recalled her earlier charge -- that Chidambaram did not win the election in a democratic way and in fact he was defeated. She had also sought his resignation earlier.
AIADMK candidate R S Raja Kannappan, who lost to Chidambaram by a little over 3,500 votes, had challenged the election with "irrefutable documents", she said.
She claimed Chidambaram "out of fear to face the case" had moved the court to dismiss the election petition "only to delay the process".
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Drop Chidambaram now: BJP tells PM
Reacting to the HC verdict, the Bharatiya Janata Party said that he has no moral right to continue in office and asked Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to sack him immediately.
"What more evidence does the prime minister need? Is this not enough evidence? On moral grounds, Chidambaram has no right to continue in office. He should have resigned earlier. We had boycotted him in Parliament, yet the prime minister did not take it seriously," BJP president Nitin Gadkari told reporters.
"In spite of all this, why are Congress, UPA, the prime minister and Sonia Gandhi giving him shelter? Sonia Gandhi had said that she will not bear with corruption and will take action. Then why are the prime minister and Sonia Gandhi bearing with Chidambaram's corruption? Why has no strong action been taken despite the high court verdict," Gadkari said.
The BJP president asked the prime minister to remove Chidambaram from his Cabinet.
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