Chandigarh, August 6
Haryana Governor Jagannath Pahadia today accepted the resignation of Minister of State for Home and Urban Local Bodies Gopal Kanda, who quit after a case was registered against him for allegedly abetting the suicide of a former woman employee of his now defunct airline MDLR.

Kanda's resignation has been accepted with immediate effect, an official spokesman said here. He had handed over his resignation to Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda in Delhi and it was faxed to the Governor earlier in the day.

Sources said Kanda, 46, had offered to step down from the post last evening at Hooda’s instance. “I spoke to the Chief Minister over the phone last evening and we decided to ask for his resignation,” said BK Hariprasad, Congress general secretary in-charge of Haryana. 

Realising that he had little options open, Kanda said he was quitting as minister to facilitate a fair investigation into allegations of abetment of suicide for which he had been booked by the Delhi Police.

Geetika Sharma, a former employee of the now-defunct MDLR Airlines, had committed suicide at her Ashok Vihar residence in Delhi. In her suicide note, she had blamed Kanda and his colleague Aruna Chadha for harassing her. 

Though Kanda’s statement was released during the day, he himself remained incommunicado with both his phones switched off. With his resignation accepted, the Congress, embarrassed over Sunday’s developments, may have got a breather especially since the Opposition has gone hammer and tongs after the government.

With Kanda’s departure, another berth in the Hooda Cabinet is now available for Congressmen, sore over not being adjusted during the last Cabinet expansion in January 2011 when four ministers were inducted.

Hooda, for the first time in six years of being in power, had filled all Cabinet posts last when he inducted the ministers. Haryana can have 14 members in the Cabinet, including the Chief Minister.

The first vacancy came in June last year when Jain’s name along with that of former Chief Parliamentary Secretary Zile Ram Sharma had figured in the murder case of a village headman in Karnal. They were booked by the police and stripped of their positions.

For those eyeing these berths, it remains to be seen if the Chief Minister will consider a second expansion to fill the vacancies.