NewsX: Bansal was widely expected to step down after police arrested his nephew last week for accepting a bribe in a case that was seen as embarrassing to the Congress party-led government which has been battered by a series of corruption scandals.

Opposition demands for the resignation of Bansal and another minister caught up in a separate scandal had paralysed parliament and forced the government this week to shelve, for now, planned economic reforms as well as a flagship programme to give cheap food to 70 percent of the population.