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Monday, Jan 30, 2006

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National

"Spurious wine in old bottle"

Special Correspondent

JD(U) warns it will raise the issue of charge-sheeted Ministers

NEW DELHI: The Janata Dal (United), a major component of the opposition National Democratic Alliance (NDA), on Sunday described the Cabinet expansion as "spurious wine in an old bottle" and warned that it would raise the issue of the presence of charge-sheeted Ministers facing charges at the Budget Session of Parliament beginning next month.

The party said Prime Minister Manmohan Singh brought back and retained two such Ministers. He had also `failed' to drop Law Minister H.R. Bhardwaj though he was "instrumental" in defreezing the bank accounts of Bofors accused Octavio Quattrochi.

JD (U) spokesperson Shambhunath Shrivastava told the media that the induction of Jharkhand Mukti Morcha leader Shibu Soren should have been avoided. "There will be another warrant and he will have to go out again. Another luminary of the same kind is Prem Chand Gupta who is facing a probe by the same department of which he is the Minister. Yet he has been promoted."

He claimed that the ruling JD (U)-Bharatiya Janata Party alliance in Bihar had not given Ministerial berths to any MLA facing charges. "One person about whom we had no information was told to quit immediately after we came to know of his criminal record."

The JD (U) spokesperson said George Fernandes would contest the post of party president during the national plenary session in Patna in March, though he had fallen ill recently.

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