MADURAI, SEPT 2: The reported decision of Union Minister Ram Jethmalani taking away the charge of key subjects from the Secretary of the Ministry was illegal, said Janata Party president Subramanian Swamy here on Tuesday.Addressing a press conference, he said that according to Transaction of Business Rules, which every minister is supposed to read, a Secretary in the ministry is ``secretary to Government, which means that no minister can allot subjects to a secretary or withdraw them''. That power was only with the Appointment Committee of the Cabinet, he added.It may be recalled that Jethmalani had taken away the charge of key subjects from his Secretary Kiran Aggarwal and assigned the work to another officer in the ministry following Swamy's allegation that there was reallotment of a complex in HUDCO Place to MS Shoes. Jethmalani had reportedly written to Prime Minister A B Vajpayee in this regard accusing the Ministry's senior officer of insubordination and passing on government papers toSwamy.Swamy said that soon after the BJP assumed office at the Centre, there were 24 bomb explosions in New Delhi with the latest incident reported yesterday morning in Central Delhi. He demanded the resignation of Union Home Minister L K Advani for his ``incompetency and failure'' in containing such acts.Besides, Swamy said, Advani was facing prosecution on two charge-sheets, one for his role on the demolition of Babri Masjid and another for falsehood under the Representation of Peoples Act in claiming an affidavit that he was a resident of Gwalior while as a Rajya Sabha MP from Gujarat. He contended that Advani has been indicted in the Srikrishna Commission report on Mumbai riots in 1992 and as the Home Minister, he had failed to protect the Hindus in Kashmir.In yet another development, Swamy charged that some of the members of RSS reportedly attempted to split the AIADMK MPs, but failed. He said that Chennai had become the second political capital in the country, with almost every leader fromDelhi arriving to hold talks with Jayalalitha who has been demanding the Centre to implement the national agenda.Training his guns at MDMK leader Vaiko, he quipped as to why did he (Vaiko) somersault after the Aug 13 meeting with AIADMK allies (which authorised Jayalalitha to take decision on the question of support to the BJP) and announced later that whether the AIADMK supported or not, the MDMK would support the BJP government.
