Thursday, November 3 2005 13:47 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

New Delhi: Stepping up its offensive, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) today (Nov 03, 2005) shot off a letter to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh asking him to drop External Affairs Minister Natwar Singh from the Union Cabinet for allegedly being a non-contractual beneficiary in the United Nations' Oil-for-food programme for Iraq.

In the letter, the main opposition party has said that the continuation of a person indicted as a 'lobbyist' by a United Nations body as the country's External Affairs Minister was untenable, party sources said.

Earlier the party had attacked the Prime Minister for giving a clean chit to 'tainted' ministers including Laloo Prasad Yadav and Natwar Singh.

The Volcker Committee, appointed by UN Secretary General Kofi Annan last year to investigate the administration and management of the 64 billion dollar programme, had listed Singh and Congress party as 'non-contractual beneficiaries'.