Saturday, December 24 2005 13:05 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

New Delhi: Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MPs expelled from Parliament for their involvement in the cash-for-query scam are holding a meeting here today (Dec 24, 2005) to chalk out their future course of action.

They were closeted at the residence of Annasaheb M K Patil, one among the tainted leaders, to discuss possible legal action against their expulsion from Parliament, citing that they were not given enough time to respond to charges made against them in the sting operation by a news channel.

"We are meeting here to discuss the future course of action. We are consulting legal and constitutional experts to chalk out out our strategy," expelled BJP MP from Rajnandgaon (Chattisgarh) Pratip Gandhi told reporters.

Terming their expulsion as against principles of natural justice, Gandhi alleged that Bansal Committee which cited the similar Mudgal case of 1950s in his report forgot that Mudgal was given 45 days to respond to the charges against him.

"But even in that case (Mudgal) a 45-day notice was given to the accused to respond and the entire process of expulsion has taken about four months," Gandhi said.

"We were expelled in just 11 days and very little time was given to respond," he added. Bansal Committee has refuted the charges raised against it saying that enough time was given to all MPs to respond to the charges.

Asked whether all fired MPs would put up a joint action, he said 'such situations' unite everybody.

"We are in constant touch with each other," he said.

Denying that they were under pressure from the party, Gandhi said he had no complaints against the party.

Parliamentary history was created yesterday when both the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha expelled 11 MPs for misconduct in accepting money for raising questions in the face of severe opposition from BJP and its allies over the procedure.