Wednesday, August 9 2006 10:58 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

New Delhi: India's former external affairs minister K. Natwar Singh, suspended from the Congress yesterday (Aug 8, 2006) night, is in no hurry to join any other party even as his supporters urge him to launch his own political outfit.

Sources close to Singh said that he is preparing to fire yet another salvo at Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in the next few days with his reply to the show cause notice issued to him by the party's disciplinary action committee which has asked him why he should not be expelled from the party for his actions in the last few days.

"The committee has decided to suspend Natwar Singh with immediate effect and issue him a show cause notice. He has been granted two weeks' time to reply to this notice," Defence Minister Pranab Mukherjee, who is also a member of the panel, told reporters at a midnight briefing.

The committee met late Tuesday under the chairmanship of former Kerala chief minister A.K. Antony to discuss Singh's case after he gave notice of a privilege motion against the prime minister in the Rajya Sabha over the leakage of a report by the Justice R.S. Pathak Inquiry Authority.

The Pathak panel, set up on Nov 11, 2005, had examined the veracity of a probe by an UN-appointed panel, which alleged that some individuals, political parties and companies including those from India were beneficiaries of the Iraqi oil-for-food programme when Saddam Hussein was in power.

The Pathak panel, which has indicted Natwar Singh and his son Jagat Singh in the oil-for food scam, was tabled in parliament Monday along with the government's Action Taken Report (ATR) that said the findings would be forwarded to three economic investigative agencies for further action.