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Porn row: Three BJP ministers resign, barred from Assembly

A day after being caught on camera watching a porn clip in the Karnataka Assembly, three BJP ministers resigned today after an embarrassed party leadership cracked the whip.

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A day after being caught on camera watching a porn clip in the Karnataka Assembly, three BJP ministers resigned today after an embarrassed party leadership cracked the whip.

A red-faced BJP swiftly went into a damage control mode asking Cooperation Minister Laxman Savadi and Women and Child Development Minister C C Patil to quit while Minister for Ports, Science and Technology Krishna Palemar was axed for allegedly providing the blue film to them.

The three ministers were also barred by Speaker K G Bopaiah from attending proceedings of the Assembly till a House inquiry committee submits report on March 12.

In his ruling, Bopaiah asked the three to give an explanation by February 13 and their reply would be placed before the proposed six-member inquiry committee, comprising two members each from BJP, Congress and JDS.

Till then, the three are barred from attending the Assembly, Bopaiah said in his order as the unsavoury episode rocked the House and provided a fodder to the opposition to take on the ruling party.

Savadi and Patil were caught on camera yesterday while they were viewing the porn video footage inside the state assembly during the proceedings, an incident that battered the image of the Sadananda Gowda Government and BJP and triggering widespread condemnation across the state.

"We don't want the party and the government to face further embarrassment. All of us have decided to resign. We have handed over our resignation letters to Chief Minister with a request to accept it," Savadi, Patil and Palemar told reporters. Savadi claimed they have done no wrong.

The direction to the ministers to quit came after the BJP summoned the trio and told them to put in their papers at a meeting attended by top leaders including Gowda, state BJP President KS Eswarappa and former chief minister B S Yeddyurappa.

The meeting took place close on the heels of BJP President Nitin Gadkari speaking to Gowda and Eswarappa and directing them to initiate action against the three ministers, party sources said.

Losing no time after the ministers fell in line, Chief Minister DV Sadananda forwarded the resignations to Governor HR Bhardwaj who accepted them immediately but that did not satisfy the opposition which created a big ruckus in the assembly demanding the disqualification of the three as MLAs.

BJP Government, already hit by a series of corruption charges, faced acute embarrassment as the fresh controversy exploded in its face after regional TV channels, which recorded the act of the ministers flipping through the porn clippings on their mobile phones, aired the footage yesterday.

Sadananda Gowda said the three ministers had sought a probe into the issue as they maintain that they only watched a clipping that was sent to their mobile and were confident of proving their innocence.

After meeting the party leaders, the three described themselves as "loyal soldiers of the party" and said, "We do not want to further embarrass the government and the party... But we have not committed any crime".

The exit of the ministers did not satisfy an agressive opposition which also demanded registering criminal cases against them apart from summary disqualification.

Speaker's announcement of a committee to probe the issue also failed to pacify the agitated opposition members with the Congress announcing boycott of the panel.

"Why should there be a committee. They have admitted to watching the clips. Please disqualify them," Opposition Congress leader Siddaramaiah insisted and staged dharna in the company of JDS members in the House.

The incident led to curtailing of the assembly session by two days, as Bopaiah adjourned it sine die.

"Yes the incident has embarrassed the party", Eswarappa admitted even as Gowda maintained that the three ministers resigned on their "own".

Karnataka witnessed protests at several places by Congress activists who condmened the incident.

With the exit of three more ministers, the list of BJP Ministers in the state who have made dishonourable exit in the last four years has risen to seven.

The present row has brought down the strength of the Gowda ministry to 24, leaving 10 ministerial vacancies.

The central leadership showed the door to BS Yeddyurappa based on the Lokayukta report on illegal mining.

Former minister SN Krishnaiah Setty had to resign from the Yeddyurappa ministry after he faced charges of land scam, followed by Katta Subramanya Naidu on similar allegations while rape charges forced H Halappa to quit as minister.

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