Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi should resign: Manish Tewari

NEW DELHI: Congress leader Manish Tewari today demanded that Union Minister and senior BJP leader Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi should step down after a court in Uttar Pradesh gave him a one-year jail term convicting him of violating prohibitory orders during the 2009 Lok Sabha polls.

"It is no automatic disqualification but the fact is that if a criminal court has a convicted a person, who is part of the Council of Ministers, he or she should very seriously introspect whether to contine in the government is proper thing to do or not.

"...Right and appropriate thing to do is that you step down from the Council of Ministers. If the higher court comes to a different conclusion, then, if your party thinks so, you can always rejoin the government, the former Union Minister said."

He at the same time said that as far his understanding of law goes, if the conviction is less than two years, there is no automatic disqualification.

Party spokesperson Abhishek Singhvi, who spoke from the AICC podium, said the minister has time to make an appeal and Congress as a responsible party will hold its horses and not say anything more on this.

Naqvi was today given a one-year jail term by a court in Uttar Pradesh after he was convicted of violating prohibitory orders during the 2009 Lok Sabha polls.