New Delhi: Team Anna Monday demanded resignation of union Minister Virbhadra Singh following a Shimla court framing corruption charges against him, and said the order vindicates its stand against the former Himachal Pradesh chief minister.
Team Anna had some time back named Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises Minister Virbhadra Singh as one of the 15 tainted ministers in the union cabinet. The former chief minister has been accused of misusing his official position and criminal misconduct in 1989.
Special Judge B.L. Soni, while pronouncing the order in Shimla, said the “materials on record show existence of criminal conspiracy by Virbhadra and Pratibha Singh”. Pratibha is wife of Virbhadra Singh.
Commenting on the ruling, Team Anna in a statement said: “Verdict of Shimla court framing charges against Virbhadra Singh vindicates the stand of India Against Corruption (IAC). When IAC named him as one of the tainted ministers in Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s cabinet on March 25, he had threatened a defamation suit against us.”
Demanding his resignation, Team Anna said: “A person against whom charges have been framed by the court for corruption certainly cannot be accepted as a part of central cabinet by the people of India.”
The court in Shimla Monday formally charged Virbhadra and his wife Pratibha for corruption, based on a CD purportedly containing the couple’s voices.
The couple was booked Aug 3, 2009, on the basis of an audio cassette released by Virbhadra Singh’s political adversary Vijai Singh Mankotia in 2007.
IANS
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