NEW DELHI: India’s opposition vowed on Tuesday to keep up its boycott of parliament for a second week to press the government to dismiss maverick Railways Minister Lalu Prasad Yadav over a massive corruption case. Last week, Yadav, a key ally of the Congress-backed government, was charged by a court in eastern India over allegations that came to light in 1996 in the multi-million dollar so-called “fodder scam.”

The railway minister’s Rashtriya Janata Dal party is the second biggest in the governing coalition after the Congress party.

“(We) ... cannot close our eyes to the corruption charges,” said Sushma Swaraj, a senior leader of the Hindu naionalist Bharatiya Janata Party. “The people’s mandate for us is to be a vigilant guard.”—AFP