New Delhi:
With Textiles Minister Dayanidhi Maran coming under the CBI scanner in 2G scam, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa has demanded that he should be dropped from the Union Cabinet immediately.
Jayalalithaa also said the CBI action of accusing him of forcing a Chennai-based telecom promoter to sell stakes to a Malaysian firm has been "long overdue" and the agency has just done what the nation has been expecting from it.
"There is no use in expecting Dayanidhi Maran to take moral responsibility and resign. It is high time that the Prime Minister dropped him from the Union Council of Ministers," she told reporters after a meeting with Deputy Chairman of the Planning Commission Montek Singh Ahluwalia.
She was responding when asked whether she expected Maran to own moral responsibility and resign after the CBI named him in its status report in the 2G spectrum scam.
"It was high time that the CBI took such a step that it took today. It was long overdue. I am happy that they have done it now," she said in response to queries on Maran being named in the CBI report.
Jayalalithaa has been demanding that Maran should resign from the Union Cabinet ever since allegations of receiving pay-offs in allotting spectrum to Aircel during his tenure as Telecom Minister during 2004-2007.
The agency in its report said that Maran has come under its scanner in the 2G Spectrum allocation scam.
In its 71-page fresh status report about the scam, the CBI said that during 2004-07 when Maran was telecom Minister, a Chennai base telecom promoter (Sivasankaran) was forced to sell the stake in Aircel to a Malaysian firm.