After keeping away from his Ministerial duties for nearly three-and-a-half months, Dharmana Prasada Rao is likely to be resume work from next week.
The Minister for R&B, has been staying away from the Secretariat ever since he submitted his resignation on August 14. Twenty days later on September 4, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) wrote to the government seeking prosecution of the Minister, as he was named in the charge-sheet in Y.S.Jaganmohan Reddy illegal assets case.
Sources close to the Minister said the passage of a resolution by the Cabinet on Friday, rejecting the prosecution sanction, it indirectly rejected his resignation. However, Mr. Dharmana will wait for formal word from the Chief Minister about rejection of his resignation before finalising an auspicious date, either on November 26 or November 28 to step into his chambers. In the meantime, the Cabinet decisions will be forwarded to the Governor for his approval.
Mr. Dharmana, who had explained to the party high command and also to the Chief Minister that he did not take any individual decisions other than implementing the collective decisions of the YSR-led Cabinet on the Vanpic project, took a line that it will be morally incorrect on his part to attend office till a formal decision was taken on his resignation letter. As the State was bound to respond to the CBI’s request for sanction of prosecution within the stipulated three months time or it would be deemed as sanction, Mr. Kiran Kumar Reddy placed the issue for discussion in the Cabinet, which favoured rejection of prosecution sanction.
A senior Minister said that Kiran did well in sitting over Dharmana’s resignation letter, which led to discussion at all levels, verification of related files, seeking legal opinion and following due procedure to satisfy himself that nowhere the Minister had taken decisions in violation of the Cabinet decisions that made him liable for criminal prosecution.
