New Delhi: Rajya Sabha Chairman Mohd Hamid Ansari has accepted MP Vijay Mallya’s resignation with effect from May 4, 2016, Deputy Chairman P.J. Kurien informed the House on Wednesday.
Earlier, Ansari had turned down liquor baron Mallya’s resignation on procedural grounds.
Rajya Sabha Secretary General has written to Mallya that the Chairman had not accepted his resignation letter as “it does not conform to prescribed procedures and does not bear signature in original”.
Quoting from the Secretary General’s letter, Ansari’s OSD Gurdeep Singh Sappal posted on Twitter that as per procedures the resignation must be voluntary and genuine. According to rules, a member, who intends to resign his seat in the House, has to intimate this in writing under his hand addressed to the Chairman, his intention to resign his seat in the Council.
Mallya, who is facing a case of loan default of over Rs 9,400 crore, had sent a scanned copy of the resignation letter to the Rajya Sabha Chairman from the U.K. in a bid to avoid expulsion, saying he did not want his name and reputation to be further dragged in mud.
The Ethics Committee had to take a decision on Tuesday on recommending his expulsion, an issue which was unanimously decided in the panel’s last meeting on April 25.
According to reports, the Committee that met on Tuesday also pointed to the wrong procedure, while rejecting the resignation. The panel members also expressed dissatisfaction with his reply about his loan default.
Mallya’s term in the Rajya Sabha was to come to an end on July 1 this year. (ANI)